Food – Page 23 – Keith Robertson

Week in Review – July 7, 2019

Hornet’s Nest

I decided to stay in McKinney with Diana this week, rather than make the trip back down to Austin. The early part of the week was heavily work focused with some system challenges keeping me busy. I’m hoping we’ve turned the corner on those now, performance has been great the last few days. Hope I didn’t just jinx things.

There were no silly 4th of July questions this year. It seems that every other year or so, somebody asks me “Do you celebrate the 4th of July in Scotland?”. I know they don’t mean do we celebrate being free of the responsibility of the United States. Ha. We celebrated with late morning workouts and then lunch at Toulouse in Legacy West. Diana was excited when her choice for restaurant stuck – the other two options we discussed were closed for the holiday. We enjoyed a delicious white wine and steak tartare with frites. I know, you’re thinking our diet is almost exclusively raw meat these days – only when we go to French places that do it well.

Dinner was the more traditional holiday fare – burgers and veggies on the grill at home. I was pretty brave to spend as much time by the outdoor grill. Why is that? Well…are you familiar with the expression “A Real Hornet’s Nest”? And did you know that I’m highly allergic to wasp and bee stings – swell up like the Elephant Man. Turns out hornets nests are not always in trees. We found five piles of sand in the beds next to the grill, looking just like ant hills without the ants. Further investigation showed some kind of bug burrowing into the ground and kicking out sand. We decided to leave well alone and wait for the pest control experts.

The pest control professional arrived on Friday morning and confirmed hornets’ nests. He was very careful in spraying them, commenting that they can be very aggressive and their sting hurts a lot. Lots of mud-dauber and wasps nests were also removed. We feel like we’re under attack from flying stingers of all varieties.

Friday was a light work day for me – I was able to enjoy a swim and watch some good Wimbledon matches. Coco Gauff’s recovery to win over Hercog was very impressive, more so considering she’s 15 years old and on the Center Court. I enjoy picturing my Mum and Dad talking to the TV as they watch Wimbledon.

Saturday started with a swim and crossword, before settling in to read and enjoy the tennis on TV, while McD sunbathed. Then I surprised Diana with an early dinner at the Grape. She says she had been thinking about going all week – must have some special ESP going. We started by sharing the chicken liver mousse, which now has the pistachio topping added back – last time we visited, over a year ago we guess, they had changed it, and not for the better. Then we split a delicious salad, followed by steak frites for Diana and scallops for me. A lovely evening and way too long since we’ve visited the Grape.

It was an early start on Sunday to get a swim and crossword in, before packing to start traveling at 1pm. Me over to the bus to Austin, and Diana to the airport for a flight to Tampa. We both arrived at our destinations about 30 minutes late – which is not too bad for the weekend after the 4th of July and the hordes of people moving around. As I finish this post up, I’ve just finished troubleshooting the internet and TV service in the apartment – the third reboot was the charm.

We received a couple of entertaining pictures from Denny and Anne this week as they continue their travels through Europe. This week in Berlin. Here Jack and Mason recreate the famous picture of them peeking their heads in to the cottage in New Orleans as we were waking up.

And here Dad and the boys manage to find an Irish bar in Berlin to watch the Womens’ World Cup Final:

Two short, quick reads were a very welcome change of pace on the literary front this week.

“The Parade” by Dave Eggers, a very favourite author, is a spare and powerful story of two men, Western contractors sent to work far from home, and tasked with paving a road to the capital in a dangerous and largely lawless country.

Four and Nine are partners, working for the same company, sent without passports to a nation recovering from ten years of civil war. Together, operating under pseudonyms and anonymous to potential kidnappers, they are given a new machine, the RS-80, and tasked with building a highway that connects the country’s far-flung villages with the capital. Four, nicknamed “The Clock,” is one of the highway’s most experienced operators, never deviating from his assigned schedule. He drives the RS-80, stopping only to sleep and eat the food provided by the company. Nine, however, spreads chaos: speeding ahead on his vehicle, chatting and joking with locals, eating at nearby bars and roadside food stands, he threatens the schedule, breaks protocol, and ends up fighting for his life when contracting malaria. His illness, corruption, and theft compromise their high-stakes mission, and Four and Nine discover danger far greater than anything they could pose to one another.

Impending doom seemed to be lurking through the last third of this book but never arrived. Then it all struck in the very last paragraph of the book. Wow – wasn’t expecting that. This book is a very impressive allegory for so many of the civil wars that are tearing countries apart.

“Biloxi” by Mary Miller is quite different than any book that I’ve read in a while. Miller skillfully transports us to her unapologetic corner of the South—this time, Biloxi, Mississippi, home to sixty-three-year-old Louis McDonald Jr. His wife of thirty-seven years has left him, his father has passed—and he has impulsively retired from his job in anticipation of an inheritance check that may not come. In the meantime, he watches reality television, drinks beer, and avoids his ex-wife and daughter. One day, he stops at a house advertising free dogs and meets overweight mixed-breed Layla. Unexpectedly, Louis takes her, and begins investigating local dog parks and buying extra bologna. Mining the absurdities of life with her signature “droll minimalist’s-eye view of America” (Joyce Carol Oates), Mary Miller’s “Biloxi” captures every day life in the South perfectly.

The exotic turntable picture is for you Raj – hope you’ve completed your audio penance.

I found this song was in my Blues Piano book as I revisited it this week. A great exercise in dexterity and I’m nowhere near up to speed yet.

Speaking of revisiting, I played this album from Charlie Hunter again this week and enjoyed it just as much as on first discovery.

And here’s a new jazz trumpeter from Italy that I enjoyed. The album gets a bit repetitive, but I do enjoy the modern sound.

Week in Review – June 30, 2019

The week started well with a relaxing and delicious lunch at June’s All Day brasserie on far South Congress. This is the place that Mark took me to for lunch when I interviewed for my job in Austin, and I hadn’t been back since. Diana and I both loved our lunch – delicious wines, smoked salmon nicoise salad for D and steak tartare for K. The heavens opened as we were finishing up and so we had to stay for coffee and wait for a brief respite in the rain. Temperatures dropped 15 degrees in a few minutes and the humidity was thankfully gone from the air for a while.

I got tied up at work until late on Monday evening. Diana was able to meet up with Sheri (after some confusion on which Kendra Scott store they were meeting at) and then they stopped back into June’s for some Happy Hour champagne.

Then they met up with Sean at the Continental Club to see the amazing Peterson Brothers. These two young men have so much positive energy and interact with each other beautifully. May they never lose those positive smiles they have playing music together. I was able to join around 7:30pm for the second half of the show. We particularly enjoyed the rendition of “Amazing Grace” on violin by Alex – it was his first instrument in school before graduating to bass guitar virtuoso.

Then the Brothers went mobile, wandering through the club, passing the guitar off to a friend at the bar to jam, heading out into the street and then plopping down in the seats behind us for a few minutes.

I thoroughly enjoyed the second hour of this show. Just what I needed after a long work day. Here’s a quick clip of the Brothers jamming:

After the show we followed the typical circuit – Hopdoddy burger followed by Hotel San Jose courtyard. Sean was able to have a nice chat with Glenn and Alex about when they were going to play in California.

Diana headed back to Dallas on the Tuesday bus and I put in some long days at the office, battling system problems.

I enjoyed a work dinner at Bonneville on Wednesday night. This is a good restaurant, just across the bridge from the apartment, that I hadn’t heard of but enjoyed quite a bit. The scallop dish was yummy.

I rode back to Dallas with Vinod on Thursday afternoon – always an enjoyable journey because of the wide ranging conversations. It was really nice to be home with Diana in McKinney for a few days.

The new movie from director Danny Boyle, “Yesterday”, was our entertainment on Saturday afternoon. We both enjoyed the movie and the interesting concept behind it. It really brought home the breadth and differences in the Beatles catalog. Diana mentioned being reminded of the Cirque du Soleil “Love” show in Las Vegas, and how it gave whole new meanings to the classic Beatles songs.

I had always thought that the Beatles “I Want to Hold Your Hand” was the number one song when I was born. I just looked it up and that was actually an honor held by the Four Pennies, with their song “Juliet”. Have you ever heard of the Four Pennies? I certainly haven’t. I like the guitar introduction to the song. It was only number one for a single week.

Take a look at the number one hits from 1964 – so many classics that we still remember. I challenge anyone to believe the same will be true of the number one hits from 2019 – most of them will be forgotten a couple of years from now. Cilla Black has a couple of number ones and she got a mention in “Yesterday” during the visit to Liverpool. What was in that Mersey water?

Date	Artist – Title	Weeks at #1
« 1963 1964 Number One Songs 1965 »
December 8 1963 – January 11 1964	Beatles – I Want To Hold Your Hand	5
January 12 – 25 1964	Dave Clark Five – Glad All Over	2
January 26 – February 15 1964	Searchers – Needles And Pins	3
February 16 – 22 1964	Bachelors – Diane	1
February 23 – March 14 1964	Cilla Black – Anyone Who Had A Heart	3
March 15 – 28 1964	Billy J. Kramer and The Dakotas – Little Children	2
March 29 – April 18 1964	Beatles – Can’t Buy Me Love	3
April 19 – May 2 1964	Peter and Gordon – A World Without Love	2
May 3 – 16 1964	Searchers – Don’t Throw Your Love Away	2
May 17 – 23 1964	Four Pennies – Juliet	1
May 24 – June 20 1964	Cilla Black – You’re My World	4
June 21 – July 4 1964	Roy Orbison – It’s Over	2
July 5 – 11 1964	Animals – The House Of The Rising Sun	1
July 12 – 18 1964	Rolling Stones – It’s All Over Now	1
July 19 – August 8 1964	Beatles – A Hard Day’s Night	3
August 9 – 22 1964	Manfred Mann – Do Wah Diddy Diddy	2
August 23 – September 5 1964	Honeycombs – Have I The Right?	2
September 6 – 19 1964	Kinks – You Really Got Me	2
September 20 – October 3 1964	Herman’s Hermits – I’m Into Something Good	2
October 4 – 17 1964	Roy Orbison – Oh Pretty Woman	3 (2)
October 18 – November 7 1964	Sandie Shaw – (There’s) Always Something There To Remind Me	3
November 8 – 14 1964	Roy Orbison – Oh Pretty Woman	3 (1)
November 15 – 28 1964	Supremes – Baby Love	2
November 29 – December 5 1964	Rolling Stones – Little Red Rooster	1

I heard a song on Spotify that I enjoyed by Alan Price. The keyboard sound was somewhat familiar, so I did some research. I found out why it sounded familiar – he was the organ player with the Animals. You’ll notice above that “House of the Rising Sun” was number one just after I was born – I still enjoy that song today and remember Billy Joel playing it when we saw him in New Orleans recently. The Western musical brain certainly loves arpeggios – particularly when a minor resolves into a nice major.

Alan Price is a self-taught musician and was a founding member of the Tyneside group “The Alan Price Rhythm and Blues Combo”, which was later renamed “the Animals”. His organ playing on “The House of the Rising Sun”, “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood”, and “Bring It On Home to Me” was certainly a big part of the group’s sound and success.

He also had a big role in introducing one of my favourite musicians, Randy Newman, to the world. Price’s second album, “A Price on His Head”, released in 1967, featured seven songs by Newman, virtually unknown at the time.

What was number one on December 18, 1964 when my wife entered the world, I hear you asking. Well – that was a Beatles song – “I Feel Fine”. Not one that I was familiar with, even though it spent 5 solid weeks at number one. Oopsy – now that I listen, I know it well. “I’m in love with her, and I feel fine”.

Changing over from music to the literary front, I finally finished “The Parisian” by Isabella Hammad. This was a very long slog of a book with lots of Arabic dialog and names. I did learn a lot about the history of Palestine in the early 2oth Century, and the influx of Jewish immigration that ultimately caused the Israeli/Palestinian conflict that still exists.

Here are some of the reviews that convinced me to embark on this read. I’m not sure I agree with any of them – this book was really hard work. I enjoyed the first few hundred pages that were set in Paris, but the Palestinian years were just work.

I’m looking forward to some lighter reading this week.

Here’s the Alan Price song that got me off on that Animals trip earlier:

Diana gave me a beautiful vinyl rendition of Bruce Springsteen’s new “Western Skies” album for fathers’ day. Here’s one of my early favourites:

How can Bruce still be making such meaningful music while performing every night in his solo Broadway show?

I’ve always loved the music of Robert Cray and came across this recent album. Ask me about seeing Robert Cray in a small club on Greenville Avenue in Dallas in the late 80s, when Stevie Ray Vaughan joined him on stage.

Week in Review – June 23, 2019

Our second wedding anniversary on Monday was welcomed with a pretty sunrise. After a long work day, we celebrated at Uchi, a sushi restaurant close to the apartment and rated one of the best in the United States. The food was excellent, as you can tell by the smile on D’s face. The service was equally outstanding, from the initial greeter, to Sam our waitress, and everyone else that interacted with us.

The rest of the week was busy with work and quite hot outside. On Wednesday evening we braved the heat for a walk along the river, passing by the movie on the lawn event on the way home. “The Goonies” was showing on a giant inflatable screen. Temperatures continued to heat up, with Thursday being the first 100 degree day of the year.

Friday afternoon took me to one of our stores on far South Congress to observe system performance during the peak time and close process. As luck would have it, C-Boys Heart and Soul was close by. Diana joined me and a couple of work colleagues for happy hour. The Rosie Flores Revue was playing (as they apparently do every Friday) – what a pleasant surprise. We’ll have to return again soon.

We met our friend Vinod for dinner on Saturday night at the newly re-opened Swift’s Attic on Congress Avenue. They had a fire several months ago and we’ve been looking forward to enjoying the amazing scallops again.

That’s the table we occupied in the bar area. The word seems to be out on the re-opening after just a few days – the whole place was quite busy.

Sunday kicked off with a nice long swim and very relaxing sauna, followed by coffee at Opa! The puzzle was by creators and an editor we didn’t know – where did Fred Piscop go? It took us both over 30 minutes to finish the “Doing the Splits” crossword.

Sean and Sheri were in Austin looking at houses and evaluating a move from San Jose. We had a drink together in the Catherine Sky Bar on Sunday evening and then a lovely dinner at Peche.

Diana and I split steak tartare (one of our favorite renditions but Justine is still the winner in Austin) and a decadent burger and fries. Sheri loved the braised short ribs and duck fat mashed potatoes, and Sean was quite happy with his bouillabaisse. Of course McD couldn’t pass up the fig foam Manhattan.

After dinner we finished off the evening at the Roosevelt Room. The bar is lovely and the cocktails good, but we decided it was just a bit too much work to get a drink in that place. I did like the interior and particularly the musician paintings – here’s one of Austin native Gary Clark Jr.

I continue to slog through my current book with a firm goal of finishing it up this coming week and getting on to some quicker, lighter summertime fare.

A work colleague told me about a solo release by Ed Jurdi of the Band of Heathens – “Bumblebee” – very nice. Diana was listening to it on Sunday morning and wondering why it sounded like the Band of Heathens, but not quite right.

The other lead singer from BoH also released a solo album a few years back. I love this song from Gordi Quist, “Satisfied Mind”:

Thinking about local musicians brought me around to Ian Moore and one of his underappreciated albums, Luminaria:

And here’s a late addition that just popped up on my Spotify playlist – seems appropriate as we enter summer. The great songwriter and performer Chuck Prophet – will never forget seeing him in Denton with less than 10 other folks – hard to believe.

Week in Review – June 16, 2019

Happy Father’s Day to my Dad and all you others celebrating today. Being a Dad – the most challenging occupation I know, filled with terrific highs, tough lows and lots of unanticipated in betweens. Here’s a picture of my Dad, sister, and brother in law at Pitmedden Gardens near Aberdeen.

This week was all work, work, work for both of us with lots of challenges to solve. I think McD solved most of hers, while I’m still battling through mine.

The only real respite all week was a very pleasant walk along the river trail on Thursday night. The city of Austin does such a good job maintaining the trail and the natural habitats. We enjoyed this guy with his long neck sticking up from the vegetation.

Friday afternoon brought a lot of work issues for me and so I was ready for some fun and relaxation when arriving home. I had bought tickets to see the author David Sedaris read from and talk about his latest book, “Calyso”, at Book People but couldn’t face the prospect of 400 people crammed into the 2nd floor space after such a long week – time for Plan B.

We walked down South Congress Avenue (SoCo) to the San Jose hotel for a relaxing drink and snack on their excellent patio. This is where we finished our evening with the Aussies and Diana sent Sue a picture of the patio. She replied that they were fighting through thunderstorms in Custer, South Dakota – those Aussies get around.

From the Hotel San Jose, we rambled on down to C-Boys Heart and Soul for the 10:30 pm show – the Mike Flanigin trio with special guest Jimmy Vaughan. Jimmy is Stevie Ray’s older brother and an excellent guitarist in his own right – albeit with a much more understated style than Stevie Ray.

I always appreciate a stage set up with a deep saxophone. Jimmy wandered in about 5 minutes before showtime with his guitar on his back and quickly set up.

The last time we saw Jimmy Vaughan was at the New Orleans jazz festival and his set in the blues tent was cut short by torrential rain. This show was in no hurry to finish. Here’s Jimmy with a nice guitar solo (see what I mean by understated?):

We shared a table with a local couple – he has been retired for 12 years and made us very jealous. They hadn’t seen Vaughan since the early 80s and were enjoying the show as much as us.

C-Boys Heart and Soul was an excellent venue, reminding me very much of New Orleans with the mix of ages and backgrounds of people enjoying the show together. The establishment also has a great patio and upstairs room that we’ll be returning to enjoy.

On Saturday, we caught an early movie on the way to a Target run. Rocketman is an excellent musical based on the life and work of Elton John – highly recommended.

The way the movie uses the songs of Elton John and Bernie Taupin to tell the story of Elton’s life is exemplary. Very creative musical performances give way to deep scenes on his early life and challenges. Diana and I were chatting about how “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” won’t mean the same to us after the visuals and story from this movie. The closing credits show that John has raised $450 million to date for his AIDS charity – amazing from a gentleman who has brought so much musical joy to so many people, and in his second act so much relief to so many people suffering from such a horrible disease.

The scene about John’s first American performance, at the Troubadour in Los Angeles, was beautifully executed, with Elton and then the crowed levitating under the power of the music.

Here’s what the LA Times music critic had to say:

“Rejoice. Rock music, which has been going through a rather uneventful period lately, has a new star. He’s Elton John, a 23-year-old Englishman whose United States debut Tuesday night at the Troubadour was, in almost every way, magnificent.”

“His music is so staggeringly original that it is obvious he is not merely operating within a given musical field (such as country or blues or rock) but, like Randy Newman and Laura Nyro among others, creating his own field.”

I chuckled on arriving at Target – there was a greeter up front to tell me that they were having computer system issues and it could take a long time to check out. I read the next day that all their stores were down for two hours – they had recovered by the time we were leaving.

Fathers’ Day Sunday started with a nice swim and sauna at the apartment, followed by coffee and crossword at Opa, and a ridiculously good brunch at Odd Duck. Chef Bryce Gilmore started out in Austin years ago with the Odd Duck farm to trailer food truck, before opening Barley Swine and then the Odd Duck restaurant.

Here’s a short documentary about the original trailer that Bryce found in Wisconsin and remodeled himself:

Our brunch started with shishito hashbrown, creamed corn, and braised goat – such a delicious combination of flavors. A close second to that was the next dish of smoked chicken skillet, sunny eggs, mushroom cream, and tobacco onions. The final dish of Mediterranean flavours – eggplant falafel, fenugreek sausage, cashew humus, and herb yogurt made it difficult to choose a favourite. We really enjoy the concept of smaller portions to share – particularly when each contains so many fresh flavours. Can you tell that I was very happy with everything about my brunch?

I write this post relaxing on the couch, pleasantly sated and watching the one of a kind views of the US Open golf at Pebble Beach.

Radio Paradise accompanied our Sunday morning reading and this song from Bob Marley caught my attention. Sentiments from many years ago still so true today:

That was followed by a song with similar messages form Ben Harper – it’s been too long since I heard his music:

And then the beautiful harmonies of The Jayhawks. A band that I always forget about until they show up on the radio or a playlist – I haven’t heard a song of theirs that I don’t enjoy:

And finally, Sonia Dada, a band formed in Chicago in 1990 by Daniel Pritzker, when he enlisted a trio of singers he heard in a subway station. Again great harmonies and voices:

Week in Review – June 2, 2019

Happy Birthday to Alicia! She hosted 5 girls for a pool party on Monday afternoon. They were mostly very well behaved. 19 year olds don’t seem to be anything like 13 or 14 year olds – much less squealing and yelling. It took poor Diana a few minutes to get all the candles lit on the mini cupcakes.

We had a pleasant surprise when Yoshy and Kerry (one of the two Aussie couples we met at the Continental Club last week) were able to join us for the birthday celebration. I grilled burgers, chicken and veggies for dinner and Alicia and Diana made huge green and fruit salads. Everyone seemed to enjoy the meal. You can see the lovely purple orchid that Kerry brought for Alicia on the right hand side of this picture. Hopefully we can keep it alive for a while after Alicia leaves.

As luck would have it, Kerry and Yoshy live only 10 minutes from our friend Stan in Brisbane, Australia. We had just been having a FaceTime session with Stan the night before.

I finally drove Penelope down to Austin on Tuesday morning. I had been worried that the 4 hour drive in her hip-hugging bucket seats would be too much for my back and sciatica pains, but it really wasn’t too bad. Seems the swimming that I’ve been doing lately is really helping with that. Penelope mentioned that she’s looking forward to exploring some of the twisty Hill Country roads after the straight shot on Interstate 35 – a very boring ride.

The morning sky on Wednesday seemed a bit gloomy and ominous. Waiting for the lift to head to work, I noticed a “stand up” meeting happening at the job site next door, where the new high rise building is starting. Made me smile, as I was headed for our 8:30 am daily stand up meeting. The ominous clouds cleared out nicely during the day and the evening was bright and sunny.

I was pleased to read that Western Youth (my favourite Austin band) were performing at Guero’s outdoor taco bar on Wednesday evening.

Sun Radio hosts a weekly showcase of two local bands every Wednesday evening at Guero’s from 6-8pm and also broadcasts live. This station always does an excellent job with sound quality and so it’s a treat to hear bands playing for them. No difference with Western Youth – easily the best sound that I’ve heard from them yet – just loud enough with clarity across all instruments.

The set by Western Youth was excellent from start to finish and I think they made a number of new fans from folks who just wandered into Gueros. Several folks asked me the name of the band and what I knew about them.

I’ll start with my favourite of their songs, “The King is Gone”:

That song always sticks in my head for a few days after I hear it. Another good song was “Dying on the Vine”:

And finally here’s “Black Freight Liner” with some high paced guitar jamming, and inspired by the Jimmie Dale Gilmore classic, “White Freight Liner Blues”. Jimmie Dale was sitting right in front of me at this show – only happens in Austin.

The extended jam version of “Norah” that closed out this excellent show was amazing, no video though – I was too busy enjoying the performance.

Penelope is enjoying Austin. She likes cruising down Barton Springs Rd with her top down, and really enjoyed the new experience of backing into the slanted parking on South Congress.

I was getting peckish after all that great music, and made a stop at the Taco Joint on Riverside, a place very close to the apartment that for some reason we haven’t tried yet. The tacos here are very good – I enjoyed a portobello mushroom and a steamed fish. Another great food option in very easy walking distance.

An overnight thunderstorm woke me early on Thursday morning and so I decided to try something new that I’d been considering for a while – a morning swim in Barton Springs pool. The pool is located in the 358 acre Zilker Park and is conveniently located on my short commute to work. The pool itself is 3 acres in size, and is fed from the underground springs of the Edwards Aquifer. The average temperature is 68-70 degrees year round, and it’s quite bracing on initial entry. Here are aerial pictures that show the impressive length of the pool and the view of downtown that one experiences when swimming lengths.

I really enjoyed the swim and particularly the very long laps that are possible. It took about 10 minutes to adjust to the cooler than typical pool temperature water. One interesting fact about the pool – this is where Robert Redford learned to swim at age 5, when visiting Austin on holiday. Barton Springs is a federally protected habitat as it is home to the endangered Barton Springs Salamander. I didn’t spot any of them but it was pretty dark for most of my swim and the pool has depths up to 18 feet. I look forward to making a few swims in Barton Springs part of my regular weekly routine.

Thursday night brought a pleasant cultural experience – a showing of the new Miles Davis documentary, “Birth of the Cool”, at the Austin film society. Admission included a cocktail, trumpet music in the lobby pre-show, a discussion with the producer, and jazz records in the lobby after the movie. What a deal for $11.

I enjoyed the movie, albeit a bit lengthy at 2 hours. I learned a few things about Miles that I didn’t know previously – his father was a very successful dentist in St Louis, and he attended Julliard to learn about music theory and composition. There was a lot of detail on the incident when Miles was assaulted by a police officer when taking a break outside Birdland in New York. The policeman told him to move along, while Miles explained that was his name on the Marquee above him. Another policeman came in and beat him severely with his night stick. Hard to believe.

There was a section on Miles’ time in Paris when he recorded one of my favourite albums, the film score for “Ascenseur pour l’echafaud”. The movie covered all phases of his career through his 1986 album, “Tutu” – another one that I enjoy a lot. What an amazing artist, who reinvented himself so many times.

“Birth of the Cool” was the opening movie of the 2019 Doc Days festival at the Austin Film Society. The large theater was sold out – great way to start the festival.

I rode back to Dallas with Vinod on Friday and had the house to myself for the night. Diana and Alicia were enjoying a few days in Boston on the back end of a work meeting that Diana attended on Wednesday. On Thursday night they visited the Union Oyster House, established in 1826, and the longest continually operating restaurant in the United States. John F. Kennedy’s booth is marked with a plaque. Diana enjoyed the lobster (pronounced “Lahbstah” by the locals”.

On Friday, Alicia enjoyed a walking tour of one of the famous Boston history

trails while Diana handled some work meetings. Diana had duck for dinner and it looks absolutely delicious. They apparently sat next to a couple for Highland Park, Dallas and had a good chat. Later, they both took a ghost tour around the area.

Continuing the duck theme, before flying home, they joined a duck boat tour on the Charles river with views of downtown.

Sunday started with a swim in the warm gym pool, followed by coffee and crossword. The evening brought a real treat – a return visit to the Kessler by Nils Lofgren, this time with his full band (including brother Tommy from Grin), and his own guitars. You might remember his equipment was stolen overnight prior to his last visit, and he had to borrow all the guitars he used.

The set started with a few songs from Nils’ new album, “Blue with Lou”. Most of the songs are from a 1978 collaboration with the late Lou Reed. Lofgren told a story of having good music but not great lyrics, when his producer, Bob Ezrin, suggested working with Lou Reed. Reed wanted to watch his favourite team, the Dallas Cowboys (weird given his role as a New York icon), play the Washington Redskins, before they worked. After a week or so, Reed called Lofgren at 4:30am to dictate the lyrics he had written for 13 songs. They have just now been released.

Here’s the set list from the show – a very strong finish including “No Mercy”. I remember first hearing this on Radio Clyde with the DJ, Dougie Donnelly, raving about the song – I was sold.

As a child, Nils took accordion and piano lessons. At 18, he was playing on Neil Young’s “After the Gold Rush” classic album. He told a great story while seated at the piano (with demonstrations) of how he used his accordion polka background to come up with the double time piano fill on “Southern Man”. As usual, Nils delighted the guitar fans in the audience, with some amazing finger picked solos, including unique harmonic work.

The encore, “Shine Silently”, was a real highlight, sending everyone home smiling.

Would you like to see some pictures from Scotland? Of course you would!

I meant to share this great picture of my Dad at Troon beach last week on my birthday. My Mum said it was a lovely day, just like the day I was born. I think she’s referencing the weather, but I like to interpret it being a lovely day because of my arrival.

The next picture form Scotland is my sister and familys’ new puppy, Bramble. It might take some time to grow into those paws. I believe Bramble is about 9 weeks old in this picture.

While we’re sharing puppy pictures, my friend Damon’s doodles have grown up quickly.

I finished the book “The Paris Diversion” by Chris Pavone this week and really enjoyed the read. A fast paced, intelligent thriller with interesting plot twists, that is also well written with great descriptions and vocabulary – a rare combination.

Pavone was an editor for 20 years before moving to Luxembourg when his wife was transferred for work, and starting to write “The Expats”. I look forward to reading that one in the future. Here’s an excerpt from the book, where Pavone describes a very annoying habit perfectly:

“Teenage girls were the worst offenders. Posing was second nature for these kids, selfie smiles rehearsed in mirrors, poses perfected after thousands of variations in body angle and head tilt, hair fluff and lip purse and peace sign, a permanent regimen of fine tuning, akin to practicing piano or laying down a sacrifice bunt, skills never attempted by these kids, who instead know how to do mainly this one thing: look like they’re having a great time in social-media photos, exposure and exclamation points compulsory, soliciting other exclamation points, an ouroboros of manufactured enthusiasm.”

Video of Carole King performing at the Montreux Jazz Festival in 1973 was released this week. This was her first performance outside of the United States. The first half is her solo performance of “Tapestry” hits, and the second is with a jazz funk band performing songs from her “Fantasy” album. I love this performance with the 10 piece funk band – excellent drummer and horn section.

Anders Osborne, singer songwriter extraordinaire from New Orleans, and good buddy of Anne, released a great new album this week. Here’s a song from that:

The late, great Rory Gallagher has new music released this week. His blues songs really grow on you with each listening. I go back to play his 1982 “Jinx” album frequently.

And finally, some local Austin music from the Black Pumas, regular performers at C Boys Heart and Soul (Continental Club sister venue). They just released a major label album after a lot of striving in tiny clubs.

Week in Review – May 26, 2019

My Birthday Week is now officially over. The torch was passed to Alicia on Saturday morning. I did enjoy a lovely week of celebrations and gifts – thanks Diana. And again, I jump ahead of myself…

The streak was broken on Monday – we had arranged to meet for lunch and then work things got in the way. I used the extra time to take Diana’s car for a bath – first time since moving to Austin, so the Passat had many layers of dust built up. I’ll have to tell Denny about the features at this car wash – free shoe shine and massage while you wait. The shoe shine guy was quite the showman, flipping his brushes around and polishing in different directions with each hand. Not sure these shoes have ever been this shiny and well oiled.

Another excellent card and gift were waiting on me when I arrived home. And it was another hand crafted card at that, from the “Kards for Keith” collection. The card talks about “Happy Music” and was accompanied by a Saxon Pub coaster – a place where my “Happy Music Face” has been seen several times.

For dinner on Monday night I chose TLV, an Israeli street food counter in the Fareground food hall. This is a collection of 5 or 6 restaurants in the bottom of the building at the corner of Congress Ave and 2nd Street – so a short walk for us. The food was excellent, with the hummus almost on a par with Shaya in New Orleans.

We explored the new Line hotel, across the street from Fareground, after dinner. Very nice restaurants and bars and there was an author presenting their book to a pretty large crowd as well.

We made a visit to the Continental Club for the free happy hour show on Tuesday night. Shelley King and her band were performing. We’ve seen Shelley several times now, and always enjoyed her songs. Four Aussies took the seats in the row in front of us and we had a great chat while we waited for the band to start. Then the first of several surprises happened. Diana noticed Carolyn Wonderland setting up her guitar. She’s not a regular part of Shelley’s band and was obviously going to sit in. We love her singing and guitar playing – this is the lady that I took my sister and family to see when they visited almost 2 years ago now. I really enjoyed the smile on Carolyn’s face as she listened to Shelley and band before sitting in.

Here’s what Carolyn sounds like on the guitar:

Then the next surprise – my friend Damon showed up. There had been some unauthorized texting by McD. The band took a break and Shelly announced surprise number three – Marcia Ball would be joining after the break. Marcia is one of my very favourite performers. What a birthday week treat – and all for no cover charge. Here’s one of their great songs together:

Surprise number four – my friend Mark showed up. Some more unauthorized communication from both McD and Damon. Mark lived behind the Continental Club for a while and had been too intimated to try it out – it doesn’t look fancy from the outside at all. He loved the music. Here’s a highlight from the second set:

I have to finish up by sharing a song that Marcia Ball took the lead on, with great lyrics:

By this point, everyone was quite hungry and so the four of us plus the four Aussies headed across the street to Hopdoddy for burgers.

We stopped into the beautiful courtyard at the San Jose hotel on the walk home and then came surprise number five. As we were almost home, we saw an electric scooter rider take a hard fall on the Congress Ave bridge. We got him off the street to find that he had a broken wrist and some nasty cuts on his head and legs. He called some friends but they hadn’t showed up after 20 minutes and he wasn’t doing very well with the wrist pain and head bonk. Damon saw Diana home and I took Brandon (scooter rider) to the emergency room in an Uber. I got him checked in (without any ID), handed over to the triage nurse, and then Ubered back home. An exceptionally fun evening (minus the ER trip) – thanks Diana for organizing and going with the flow with the surprises that you didn’t orchestrate!

My birthday present from Mum and Dad was waiting when I got back to the apartment from the ER, a bit after 1am, and McD was quite insistent that I open it up. Meet Harris McCoo (left) and Donald McDee (right). There from the Scottish artist Steven Brown who is becoming quite famous these days. I really love his work and these selections.

My poor wife had a long day on Wednesday – bus ride back to Dallas and then a fancy work dinner that didn’t end until around 10pm. I had considered going to see the Blues on the Green concert in Zilker Park, but was too tired leaving work to deal with getting there and back. Diana did make it home with a load of great leftovers that I enjoyed after driving up from Austin on Thursday night.

I was happy to find the garden doing very well in my absence – it’s amazing what a lot of rain does for the plants.

While troubleshooting a big work issue, my amazing and fierce wife also whipped up a delicious made from scratch “end of birthday week” dinner of my favourites. Pavlova birthday cake and two kinds of meat pies (the best versions yet). Alicia gets a lot of credit for helping as Diana had to jump on and off calls and send update emails. The results of all their toil were excellent.

I almost forgot to mention the delicious cheese and meat appetizer platter they created for me:

I was quick to make a wish and blow out those double nickel candles.

Then it was time to open some more presents. A very unique “Cool Stones” box from Campbell – stones that you put in the freezer and use in your drink to prevent melting ice from watering it down.

And Will with an equally unique gift of some “Maritime” cologne.

Midnight rolled around and the birthday week torch was passed over to Alicia. We started with a lovely dinner out at The Keeper in Plano. Diana and I think they have the best calamari we’ve tasted, and all of their seafood is fresh and tasty. Alicia enjoyed her meal very much.

We got some bad news as we left to go for workouts on Sunday morning. Our favourite neighbours across the street are moving to Frisco. Apparently they started out looking to downsize, and then found a home with the perfect outdoor living situation and couldn’t resist. We’ll really miss having them there if we ever need anything. I enjoyed a good, long swim and then we came home to complete the crosswords as McD was still working to finish up the work issue. I did some yard work and then retired inside to the air conditioning, while Diana was ultimately able to enjoy some well deserved pool time.

This excellent live version of Greg Allman covering Jackson Browne’s “These Days” popped up on my Discover Weekly list from Spotify – what a nice pop-up surprise.

I heard this amazing song from the most underrated band, The Kinks on the radio this week.

The Boz Scaggs album “Out of the Blues” got my attention this week. I listened to it last year on release, but missed that the excellent guitar work was from the combination of Doyle Bramhall II and Charlie Sexton (of Arc Angels fame). Jim Keltner also provides solid drumming.

Finally, a new album from a jazz pianist that I enjoy very much, Brad Mehdlau. This is quite an experimental album with a bit of political commentary. I’ve only listened once and think I’ll enjoy it more and more with repeated listens.

Week in Review – May 19, 2019

The gorgeous Austin weather continued on Monday and I was surprised by a very rare occurrence. My wife declared that she had a break in the middle of the day and invited me to go to lunch with her. I jumped at the opportunity before a meeting filled in her open slot and we enjoyed a lovely lunch on the patio at Shady Grove. I’m working hard to enjoy al fresco dining as much as I can before the summer weather arrives. We even had time for an after lunch coffee on the patio at Opa. The surprises continued when I got home to find work had been completed for the day at the apartment. Wow – I wonder how long this might last?

On Tuesday we tried the restaurant Zax, which is located right next to the Catherine and has what they describe as a “perfect patio”. We sat at the bar and shared a “Blues Burger” – blue cheese and crumbled onion rings. The visit was actually a scouting trip to see if this would be a good place to meet our friend Rob and his wife for dinner on Wednesday (he ended up having to cancel). Somebody told us a few years ago that the easiest test of a restaurant is to see if they make a good burger. Zax passed the test with a tasty and nicely cooked burger. The ambiance inside was a bit quiet and dated but the patio looked fun.

My friend Rodrigo from Guatemala met us at the Sky Bar on Wednesday night. He was having such a good time getting to know Diana and catching up with me that we ended up closing the place down. K was quite sleepy on Thursday.

And speaking of Thursday – something strange and wonderful happened. Can you guess what? There was a hint early in this post. That’s right – my wife was free for lunch for a second time in the same week. This time we enjoyed another perfect weather day on the patio at Opa with lamb gyros and a greek salad. I was really sleepy after that.

Having selected our apartment for the shortest possible (within reason) commute to the office, I was irked to see the news on Thursday night. A new high rise building going in next to us is requiring lane closures right next to the Catherine building for three months. Ugh! I’m sure it won’t add too much time to my commute, but I’ve really been enjoying getting to the office in 10 minutes rather than the hour it took in Dallas.

It happened again on Friday! What a surprising week. McD had time for a Target run in the morning and so dropped me at the office and then….wait for it…met me for lunch again. I didn’t have a lot of time and so we had a quick bite at Cava, a Mediterranean place where you select the ingredients for a salad or grains bowl – all very fresh and tasty.

My official birthday week kicked off when I got home on Friday evening with a bowl of one of my favourite food groups presented by BP (Baby Penguin). All of the penguins also put together a very creative card to recognize the birthday week.

Diana pulled together a tasty kickoff dinner of gnocchi with a garlic mustard aioli. I just enjoyed the leftovers for lunch as I was writing this post.

I tried something new on Saturday morning – swimming laps in the apartment pool. The temperature was a bit bracing initially but I had a nice long swim, followed by some relaxation time in the sauna. Swimming really eases my back pain and so I look forward to repeating this start to the day until the pool gets too hot.

I chose a new destination for coffee and a crossword with Keith. High Note is a new restaurant from the Kerbey Lane group and features fresh and healthy breakfast and brunch options with a Mediterranean flair. We shared blistered shishito peppers and I enjoyed a Kale Mary (very green and healthy). We both liked High Note and the food coming out around us looked very good. Another good coffee and brunch option in walking distance.

My official birthday dinner out was on Saturday night. We tried a french restaurant in East Austin called Justine’s Brasserie for the first time and were very pleased.

We shared steak tartare as an appetizer and both agreed it was the best we’ve had in a long time – very tender and perfectly seasoned. I followed that with a scallop special dish with corn and beurre blanc – again very good scallops and perfectly cooked. Diana’s rib-eye steak was very tasty but just a little bit too rare for me – she’s turning into quite the rare meat connoisseur. Brent will be proud.

Arriving home after dinner, I was presented with this excellent gift. It’s a quote from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, a 19th century poet most famous for “Paul Revere’s Ride”. It makes me think of the Playing for Change series that I shared a couple of weeks ago where musicians from around the world collaborate on songs.

Sunday started with a swim and sauna. While Diana sunned herself by the pool, I walked down South Congress to the Continental Club to see the matinee show (3:30pm) with the Marshall Hood band. It was interesting to step into the dark and well air conditioned club from the bright, hot day outside.

This was a very enjoyable afternoon jam session. The piano player was particularly impressive.

The band would have a short discussion after each song about what they would like to play next. I have the sense they have an exceptionally large repertoire.

I was checking to see if my favourite Austin band, Western Youth, were playing anywhere close this week and came across this video of them playing on Balcony TV – a show filmed up at the Catherine Sky Bar. It’s interesting to hear how much this song has evolved from this early performance.

I heard this Split Enz song on the radio this week. Made me think of the Leaky Boat song and how this band was the precursor to the excellent Crowded House band.

The National’s new album has been on heavy rotation on my office music playlist this week – very good and quite different than their previous offerings.

Eric Tessmer is playing at the Granada theater where they do a good job of advertising, “Goes Great With…a list of similar artists”, as a way to introduce us to new artists. The list for Eric Tessmer included several of our favourites and so I gave him a listen on Spotify. What do you think?

I agree, not bad, but not someone I’m going to go out of my way to hear.

Western Youth on Balcony TV.

Week in Review – May 12, 2019

A belated Happy Mother’s Day to all of you who were celebrating on Sunday.

We had a lovely day, but wait…, I’m jumping way ahead of myself already…

I meant to share this New Yorker cartoon last week as “May the 4th be with you” is a big day for Star Wars fans. Peter Mayhew, who played Chewbacca in most of the Star Wars movies, also passed away last week. I didn’t realize that he was 7 feet 3 inches tall at his prime.

Also from last week: Brent published the long awaited “Sometimes Less Lean is Mo’ Lean” article. I say “long awaited” because this was inspired by a Keb’ Mo’ concert that we saw in 2014 for my birthday – the night of the now infamous Velvet Taco stop in a torrential downpour.

https://www.lean.org/LeanPost/Posting.cfm?LeanPostId=1038

I really enjoy the way Brent links process efficiency concepts to the concert experience and encourage you to give this excellent short article a read.

Now on to this week – a very wet one in Austin, starting from my bus ride down on Monday all the way through Saturday. Lots of flash flood warnings were issued as river and lake levels rose – Lake Travis peaked at over 104% full. The basement level of our office experienced some flooding and required a lot of drying machines to avoid mold developing:

While I was navigating through all the rain in Austin, my Mum and Dad were enjoying a trip to St. Anne’s with their church friends. They made a day trip to Liverpool, where it was also wet when this picture of the fifth Beatle was taken:

“How far is Liverpool from their home in Scotland?”, I hear you asking. About a 4 hour drive as you can see on this map of the UK or in much smaller scale on the World satellite view.

My parents enjoyed the architecture on their tour, including the “Liver Birds” atop these buildings:

These were the inspiration for the Seventies sitcom featuring the antics of two Liverpudlian lasses. Guess what they called it? You nailed it – “The Liver Birds”. I didn’t remember it from the name, but after watching a YouTube video, I remember it quite well from my childhood.

The “Ferry Cross the Mersey” (main river in Liverpool where much of the ship building industry was based) was passed up due to the weather.

The rain has certainly been doing wonders for my Dad’s garden. Spring has certainly sprung in Stewarton.

Back in Austin, Diana arrived on the bus on Thursday evening. We enjoyed the standing Friday happy hour show at the Saxon Pub – Diana’s first visit. Denny Freeman and his band played a mixture of blues and rock hits from the 60s and 70s. Here’s their version of the Jagger/Richards song, “Heart of Stone”:

Diana enjoyed the Saxon Pub experience and particularly the folks “dancing like nobody was watching”. This place is full of happy, friendly people looking to enjoy the music. An interesting couple joined us at our table. Bill and Marianne met in a Chinese restaurant in Peurto Vallarta during a thunderstorm. Bill attended UT before riding his Harley across country to San Francisco, where he got a job as a mailman, during the “Summer of Love” in 1967. He had just had ankle replacement surgery – did you know that was an option? We’ve heard of hips and knees, but I hadn’t heard of ankles.

We walked across the street from the Saxon Pub to Chi’lantro for a snack. This is an Asian Fusion, Korean style restaurant with excellent “Kimchi” fries and Korean chicken wings. Not familiar with kimchi? I wasn’t either but it’s kind of a cabbagey concoction. Wiki says: a staple in Korean cuisine, kimchi is a famous traditional side dish of salted and fermented vegetables, such as napa cabbage and Korean radish, made with a widely varying selection of seasonings including gochugaru (chili powder), scallions, garlic, ginger, and jeotgal (salted seafood).

I was managing the amount of time that we spent at Chi’lantro very diligently. Why was that necessary at 8pm on a Friday night? Well, I had a surprise planned for Diana, and needed to arrive back at the apartment as close to 8:36pm as possible. I know, a pretty precise and strange time for a surprise. Ok, I know the suspense is killing you. I had arranged for Alicia to surprise McD for Mother’s Day and that was the estimated arrival time of her Uber from the airport. I was a tad concerned that Diana would be upset with me for flying Alicia out when she should be studying for finals, but the visit was very well received and some pretend studying did occur.

We added Alicia to the typical weekend morning routine. Workout, followed by Keith’s famous breakfast tacos, then a trip to Trianon coffee (my favourite close to work) for coffee and crossword (Alicia made a genuine attempt to participate). Then we made a run through Trader Joe’s to fill back up the empty fridge and pantry.

The weather cleared up nicely on Saturday afternoon and I dropped the ladies off on South Congress Avenue for a ramble around the shops and restaurants. I went to try out the Austin Film Society and a documentary called “Carmine Street Guitars”.

Greenwich Village was once the center of New York bohemia and, like many other artsy neighborhoods around the country, has gone through significant gentrification in recent years. But one shop in the heart of the Village had remained resilient to the encroaching gentrification: Carmine Street Guitars. There, custom guitar maker Rick Kelly and his young apprentice, Cindy Hulej, build handcrafted guitars out of reclaimed wood from old hotels, bars, churches, and other local buildings. Nothing looks or sounds quite like a Rick Kelly guitar, which is the reason they are embraced by the likes of Bob Dylan, Lou Reed, and Patti Smith. The film captures five days in the life of Carmine Street Guitars, while examining an all-too-quickly vanishing way of life.

I enjoyed the movie but felt it was a bit too contrived and staged for my liking. The visit to the store by Charlie Sexton and the McSorley’s (oldest bar in New York) guitar he plays were worth the price of admission.

This video was playing as we were seated for the movie (Heatwave performing “Too Hot to Handle”). Hilarious seventies funk performance. Stick with it until the part where the guitar and bass player are on the shoulders of the two singers. Hadn’t seen anything like this in years.

We reconvened at the Apartment for dinner and then walked across the bridge to Antone’s for a concert. Roxy Roca was opening for Big Sam’s Funky Nation. Diana chose this as her Mother’s Day eve show over Sis DeVille at the One to One Club. Unfortunately the show was over 21 only and so Alicia practiced her story on the walk over. No real problem getting in – just a couple of questions that she handled well.

We hadn’t heard of Roxy Roca and were going to skip the opening act, but some YouTube research showed a great brass section and music that we thought we’d enjoy. They are an Austin based band and put on a good opening set.

We enjoyed Big Sam’s Funky Nation a few months ago at the Kessler, when they opened for the Rebirth Brass Band. It was great to see them as the main attraction. Happy, fun music very well presented. So much so that we couldn’t drag Alicia out of the show. “Two more songs and we’re leaving!” “No we’re not!”. We did finally leave a little after midnight and tried again to make a visit to the Elephant Room for some late night jazz. The band was on a break and the place was crowded, so we made the walk back to the apartment earlier than we might have – probably a good thing.

At around the same time in California, Cat was finishing up a very grueling day of testing for his black belt. He’s trying to look mean and tough in this picture and I can tell he’s exhausted. A very impressive and dedicated effort he’s made to get this far over the last few years. Late breaking update as I’m about to publish – Cat passed the test and received his official black belt!

I chose the Launderette restaurant in East Austin for Mother’s Day brunch, based on a strong recommendation from my friend Issac, who lives nearby. We sat on the front patio and enjoyed the lovely weather – that’s where the picture at the top of this posting was snapped. The restaurant used to be the “Kleen Wash” launderette.

What an amazing meal we enjoyed. My duck confit hash was excellent and Alicia’s turkish egg was an outstanding blend of flavours. I’m looking forward to trying dinner. I included the second picture below just in case you were concerned that we were able to finish the feast in the first.

But wait, there’s more. I had read that the pastry chef was excellent and so we agreed to share a desert. The arugula cake with meringue, rhubarb, and strawberries was both completely unique and delicious. The presentation reminded us of the garden dish at Manresa on our anniversary dinner.

After lunch we explored the riverside park just a couple of blocks from the restaurant. The city of Austin does such a great job maintaining the 10 miles of trails along the riverside. This section had some impressive fields of wild flowers.

We dropped Alicia back at the apartment for some more “studying” and then walked across the 1st Street bridge and down the riverside trail to Rainey Street. This is the historic area that I took Denny on his visit, where small houses have been turned into bars and restaurants. The street was hopping on Sunday afternoon and McD and I chose the back patio at Lucille as a good spot to relax for a while. There was a lot of entertaining activity – karaoke in progress, various games with rings and bean bags, puppies entertaining themselves trying to eat the Jasmine plant and then falling fast asleep. We walked up the street and back over the Congress bridge, pausing to take a funny picture at the Little Brother bar.

Mother’s Day celebrations wound down with a visit to the Sky Bar for mimosas by mother and daughter.

I heard this song from Shriekback, an English band most popular in the mid-80s but still playing today, on Radio Paradise and enjoyed the sound.

Shortly after that song, this Morcheeba song came along. I listened to this band quite a bit many years ago and enjoyed this newer song.

The National is often a bit too mopey and down for me, but I enjoyed this one.

And to close out the post, a brand new band to me, Pedro the Lion. NPR was raving about this album in a post and I did enjoy most of it.

Week in Review – May 5th, 2019

My happy face was clearly visible around 3pm on Monday. “What brought that on?”, you ask. That’s about the time that we landed in New Orleans to spend the week with Denny and Anne and the rest of our local friends.

Monday night was reasonably quiet and mellow and we kept our destinations local to the Uptown area. Denny approved my idea of going to see John Fohl at Dos Jefes at 9pm, and added a pre-show stop at the “Kingpin”, a great nearby dive bar.

This bar is most famous for featuring in one of the late, great Anthony Bourdain’s television shows. Particularly the taco truck that parks out front. I do think that this is a great place to settle in with a good book.

Dos Jefes cigar bar doesn’t look like much from the outside (in typical New Orleans fashion) but features great live music every night of the week. John Fohl, best known as the guitar player in Dr. John’s band for many years, has a standing Monday night gig. We saw him there a few years ago and really enjoyed his set. I enjoyed this riff on James Booker’s “Classified”:

I really do enjoy the feel of this music and cigar bar. Always a friendly and fun crowd.

Anne was able to join us for the show and, as is pretty typical, took time to have a long conversation with Fohl. Mr. “Good Lord” Alex was also able to join us about half way through the first set. Here’s another one of the songs from an excellent first night in New Orleans:

Tuesday festivities started at a new restaurant, “Justine”, in the French Quarter – thanks to Anne for “Oganizing” reservations. This is the new venture from Justin Devillier, the chef/owner behind “La Petite Grocery” – a place we’ve loved for several years. Justin appeared on Top Chef season 11 and has won many awards since beginning his career as a line cook in 2004.

I think we could easily have made a meal from the appetizer section of the menu – steak tartare, fois gras torchon, lobster tartine, grilled octopus – a line up of all our favourites and all beautifully executed. We then split a couple of delicious entrees – lobster raviolo and a morrocan spiced short rib.

Justine is nicely divided into several smaller sections with different themes – front al fresco, middle formal, rear mural and outside courtyard. We enjoyed these two murals in the back section:

We left a nice, long lunch very well sated but not overly stuffed. Another amazing New Orleans dining experience.

We walked off some of lunch with a short ramble through the Quarter and stop into Mr. B’s for bubbles in the courtyard. Then it was back to Webster Street to rest up for the evening.

Diana and Anne didn’t have much of a rest before heading out for oyster and champagne Happy Hour at Pascal’s Manale. This is always one of the highlights of McD’s trips to New Orleans, as she gets to catch up with her New Orleans girlfriends.

As we were getting ready to head out for the evening, Denny’s neighbor asked for some help pushing his 1956 Thunderbird into the garage, resulting in this entertaining video:

After all that exertion (well, maybe not so much for Mason) Denny and I headed over to the HiHo lounge to catch an early music show. Every Tuesday they host “Ruby Tuesday”, where various musicians cover the Rolling Stones songbook. The doorman let us know that it would be all Stones except for his special request for “Atlantic City”, the Bruce Springsteen song that was famously covered by the band – that was a highlight for me.

The other highlight from the first band was “Loving Cup”, one of my favourite Stones songs:

The second band was Roddy Romero, Grammy nominated artist from Lafayette, and a friend whose name I missed. I enjoyed their cover of “Beast of Burden” (much quieter than the first band):

We hadn’t had quite enough music yet, and rode over to the French Quarter again to see Dragon Smoke at One Eyed Jacks – now having rendezvoused with Diana. This band is a kind of New Orleans supergroup that has come together on the Tuesday night of the week between Jazzfest weekends to perform a one of a kind show for the last 19 years. The members are Ivan Neville (Neville Brothers and Dumpstaphunk), Eric Lindell, Stanton Moore (Galactic) and Robert Mercurio (Galactic). I laughed at the sign outside the venue stating “Early Show – Dragon Smoke – Sold Out” which I saw after 11pm still waiting for the band to assemble from their other various gigs and start.

What an amazing show! The Galactic rhythm section has a one of a kind ability to build a song up gradually until the crowd goes nuts. Here’s a snippet showing Stanton Moore’s skills:

Eric Lindell and Ivan Neville traded vocal duties on the songs which added a nice variety. Here are songs from each of them:

Wednesday started with a pleasant walk around the loop in nearby Audubon park. The park was historically the first sugar cane plantation in Louisiana and is now home to many hundred plus year old oak trees, a nine hole golf course and the New Orleans zoo. The path is just under 2 miles long and makes for a leisurely start to the day.

A light lunch at the Rum House on Magazine St was followed by some light shopping and a coffee and champagne (one of us had coffee and one had champagne – hmm, I wonder which I had) at The Vintage.

We had an excellent dinner experience at Patois, just down the street from Denny and Anne’s home. I started with a duck mousse pate that was amazing and Diana had some beautifully cooked octopus in a sizzling skillet.

My main course was risotto with crawfish and mushrooms – absolutely amazing. Diana chose paneed veal – also perfectly cooked and on top of some delicious pearl cous cous.

After dinner, we did our best to reenact a picture taken outside Patois several years ago. Can you find a few things different between the two pictures? Ah, that’s too kind of you, and I agree that we really haven’t changed a bit.

While we were enjoying dinner, the famous Welsh singer, Tom Jones, was enjoying Jon Cleary’s piano music at the small Chickie Wah Wah music club (host to Anne’s excellent birthday party with the Creole String Beans performing). Jones was in town to perform at the Jazzfest on Thursday and decided to enjoy some local music the night before. As is typical in New Orleans, he was invited to join the band for some Elvis tunes:

I read that he did a great job with all his classics at the festival on Thursday, including “What’s New Pussycat?”. I had a flashback to Mum trying to teach me to waltz to this song in our Merrick View living room many years ago. I’m sure I was a horrible student.

Thursday also began with a pleasant stroll through Audubon park. I always enjoy seeing the moss in the trees that is so typically Southern. This was used to make mattresses and I’m sure was pretty comfortable.

We spent a relaxing afternoon reading on the back patio and then it was time to meet up with a work friend for dinner.

Norma, my CIO for Latin America and based in Guatemala, bought tickets to Jazzfest when the Rolling Stones were originally scheduled to play on Thursday. She kept her plans to visit New Orleans and met us for a delicious Peruvian dinner at Tito’s Ceviche and Pisco. The weather was good and we sat on the patio and enjoyed a good sampling of the menu. The lamb shank and hanger steak with pesto linguine were my favourites.

After dinner, we invited Norma and her friend to join us for the “International Blues Invitational” show hosted by New Orleans music legend, Johnny Sansone, in the event space of Monkey Hill bar. This was an excellent show in a great small venue. The blue lights at the front of the stage made it challenging for me to get good pictures and video. Things started out very well with Luke Winslow King and Roberto Luti. Luke is a good friend of my old boss, Vince, who had sent me a signed copy of his last album – it was very nice to hear it live.

Roberto Luti (guitarist on left side of stage) is from Tuscany and now makes his home in New Orleans. He started a project called “Playing for Change” that I think is amazing. Musicians from all around the world collaborate on songs via video. Here’s one that features Roberto at 3:08:

Sansone did a great job of recruiting talent for such a small show. John Fohl made his second appearance of the week, this time on electric guitar, and was joined by the amazing Joe Crowne on keyboard.

The excellent evening closed with some Blues royalty. The band including Fohl, Crowne, and Sansone, were joined by Benny Turner, younger brother of Freddie King and bass player for years in the Freddie King band. What a treat and what a character.

Our Friday at Jazzfest was upon us. This is the 50th anniversary of this wonderful institution and we were hoping for good weather and a great day. As you can see, the skies started off a bit overcast and threatening rain.

We set up camp at the main Acura stage and then began a ramble around the various stages – first stop Congo Square to see some of the Batiste Brothers family band.

From Congo we made the walk through to the Gentilly stage for Shamarr Allen. What an amazingly small cornet he uses, but still gets a great sound. McD was annoyed when Shamarr started her favourite “Weekend Dance” song only to be shut down by the festival police as he reached the end of his time slot – nobody goes over time at Jazzfest.

We ran into Shamarr later at the festival and Diana was able to tell him how much she had enjoyed his show at Antone’s in Austin a few weeks ago.

Next was a quick jaunt back to the Fais Do Do stage (Anne’s favourite) where a lot of local Cajun style music is featured. Cedric Watson was a classic example of this style. I was entertained by his punk rock, Joan Jett looking, washboard player.

Back to Gentilly for Leo Nocentelli (of The Meters guitar fame) and his band. This was a good show and I enjoyed him featuring his granddaughter, Harper, on “Fire on the Bayou”:

Getting tired of walking and too hot in the sun yet? Me too, so we stopped into the paddock area for a breather and some shade.

Now it was time for some of the yummy festival food. Diana enjoyed the trio of crawfish sack, fried oysters, and oyster/crawfish pastry and I wolfed down a cochon du lait po’ boy.

At this point the group splintered a bit – Diana and I made our way back to Acura (the main stage) to relax in the chairs while the rest of the crew rambled around various other stages. I picked up one of my favourite festival foods on the way – a spicy meat pie. We were fortunate to run into the guest country group from the Bahamas on the way as they paraded through the festival:

We caught the end of the Voice of the Wetlands Allstars, followed by Wayne Toups for some authentic Cajun music. Then the group reassembled at base camp for the headlining act, Chris Stapleton.

Diana and I both enjoy his music very much and thoroughly enjoyed this set. An early highlight was “Fire Away”:

The sound was so much better than when he opened for The Eagles at ATT Stadium. Those Jazzfest sound guys have learned a few tricks over the 50 years.

Diana faught her way up front to get a better view and got this picture from the screen looking out on the extensive Jazzfest crowd. Can you see us back there on the left side?

The show featured all of our favourites and finished up with the classic, “Tennessee Whiskey”:

Another amazing Jazzfest day in the books.

Back on Webster Street, we enjoyed a relaxing evening in the kitchen as Anne whipped up fine restaurant quality crawfish Monica pasta and bread.

Our New Orleans vacation started to wind down on Saturday. We had a midday flight but managed to work in one final meal with Denny and Anne before heading to the airport. Echo’s Pizza offers a very nice brunch – Diana and I shared the Echo’s Breakfast – avocado toast, eggs, bacon, and potatoes (delicious). The heavens opened just as we were leaving and so Denny and Anne very kindly dropped us at the airport. Those two are the best hosts you could ever hope for and have been to us for so many years – very special!

We arrived smoothly back in McKinney around 3:30pm. No signs of any issues from all the storms and tornado activity that we’d heard about during the week. Pizza and a movie sounded good after all the activity of the week. We watched a Kate Hudson movie set in New Orleans (two of my favourites so it couldn’t be all bad):

A typical Sunday started with workouts – this time I had a swim to try and straighten out my back (worked reasonably well). Then we drove to downtown McKinney for coffee, crossword, and quiche with K at Filtered.

Just as we got settled by the pool for an afternoon of reading in the sun, the neighbours showed up to spread the mulch we bought from their Boy Scout troop – ugh! We sent them to the front garden first and then took a break from the sun as they finished the back garden.

This was an excellent vacation week filled with all my favourites – amazing friends, delicious and unique food, and excellent music.

Week in Review – April 21, 2019

It was an early (4:30 am) start on Monday to catch the 6:00 am bus back to Austin. After some shenanigans with Lyft giving me a driver 27 minutes away to fulfill my request for a 4:50 am pickup, I made it just in time for the bus and enjoyed a smooth journey (mostly sleeping). Santiago, my Lyft driver, did entertain me with stories of his time on the Bolivian national soccer team and his attempt to get his PGA card – quite the sportsman and a very interesting conversationalist.

My main accomplishment for the remainder of Monday was getting D’s car inspection completed, so that she could register the car. I did struggle on this as the insurance document wasn’t in the glove box (that I could see). Turns out it was in the owner’s manual in a secret shelf on top of the glove box that tall people would never see.

Another early start alarm awoke me on Tuesday so that I could make my 7:00 am Physical Therapy appointment. PT is really working well – I was completely pain free when I left and have had very manageable pain most of the week. I get a few funny looks as I drop to the office carpet and perform the exercises that bring me almost instant pain relief.

Here’s a short riddle that was on the board at PT:

x+8 = 12

x-5=11

x is the same in both equations. What is x?

Need a hint? Read down to just before the music section.

On the way home, I stopped into the Saxon Pub for the weekly David Grissom happy hour residency. You’ll remember me raving last week about the film we saw about the Saxon Pub at the Dallas International Film Festival. One of the more entertaining characters is Chris who works the sound board and absolutely loves his job. He does an amazing job on the sound. Here is on Tuesday night working the sound and also the lights (using some special tool comprised of a rod with a tennis ball on top).

As I was entering the Saxon, I saw a character walk by and thought to myself that the crowd was getting a bit rougher and dirtier. Turns out that was Chris Maresh, the bass player for David Grissom. I felt guilty about my initial assessment as it became obvious that Maresh is a world class, virtuoso bass player – reminding me a lot of Jaco Pastorius of Weather Report fame.

He began his professional music career in Austin in 1984 after receiving a degree in Applied Double Bass Performance with an emphasis in Jazz Performance from the University of Texas. Over the ensuing 35 years, Chris has performed on an amazing 250 albums. His big break came when he played with guitar legend Eric Johnson for 10 years. His side project, Alien Love Child, was nominated for a Grammy award for Best Pop Instrumental for the song “Rain” in 2002.

Can you hear the perfect interplay between bass and guitar. That’s exactly the thing that brought out my “Happy Music Face” at the Saxon.

Chris has also released two solo albums of original jazz material. I’ve only listened to one so far and the musicianship is very good.

Grissom’s drummer, Bryan Austin, was equally impressive with some strong jazz capabilities as well. His online profile is very sparse – all I was able to find is that he played with Santana at some point.

My favourite song of the show was “A Good Day for the Blues”, a song that Grissom wrote in the mid-nineties when in a band called Storyville with Chris Layton and Tommy Shannon from the Arc Angels (and originally Stevie Ray Vaughan).

It’s a rare treat to have music of this quality available for the cost of a tip on my short commute from work to the Catherine.

Severe thunderstorms had been forecast for Wednesday afternoon or evening since early on Monday. Predictions of 2 inch diameter hail caught our attention as the storm was scheduled to hit both Dallas and Austin. A lot of folks made plans to drive home early to avoid the storm that was initially scheduled for around 4pm on Wednesday. Storm arrival time was pushed back throughout the day and it ultimately arrived when we were both asleep. Diana slept through it in Dallas but I was awoken by the loud thunder just before 2am. It doesn’t seem like there was any major hail damage.

Diana decided to leave Penelope safely in the garage at home and take an Uber to her first meeting in downtown Dallas. We were chatting on the phone as she waited for the car to arrive and I was talking about the interesting driver that I had on Monday. Then this was the view of the boot of the Uber as she went to stow her luggage:

Apparently the driver likes to play the trombone and makes occasional trips to New Orleans to play in a church and at various places on Bourbon Street. Diana’s bus arrived later on Thursday evening. I could tell she was ready to be in Austin as I got the countdown clock texts on her arrival time: 34 mins, 22 mins, 15 mins, 10 mins.

Diana had warned me that she was ready to go out on Friday evening, having been cooped up in meetings all week and then on the bus trip down. We had an early dinner at 2nd bar and kitchen – some of our usual favourites: smoked salmon rilletes and avocado fundido. After dinner we walked up Congress Avenue to the Listening Room at the back of The Townsend. This is an amazing room with perfect acoustics that only seats about 60 people.

We saw John Nielson perform with opener Michael Davids.

Michael Davids had a couple of tables full of friends with him. True to form, Diana discovered that they all worked for a cyber security firm with a couple of the folks employed as ethical hackers. I swear she can find out more about people in a few minutes than I do in years. He attempted to get the crowd to engage in a singalong with Jackson Browne and Elton John songs with reasonably tepid results, but mostly played his own original songs.

I had not heard of John Nielson when doing research for McD’s night out, but listened to some of his songs and thought he had a great voice and good songs. His performance was true to expectations with a number of memorable original songs. He appears to make some of his living from having his songs used in TV shows. Here’s one of his performances:

We were walking back home down Congress Street when I heard a good cover of “Have you ever seen the rain?” by CCR coming from the Shiner Saloon. I had never been in this particular establishment and found it very pleasant – good music and a very nice upstairs patio with various games. We enjoyed watching these kids playing a very large Jenga game.

Saturday began with workouts downstairs and then Diana put me on notice that she was planning to spend a few hours out by the pool. It was a perfect day and so I decided to go for a walk along the river trail. Here’s a sequential series of pictures looking back on the Catherine that I took on the walk:

The trail is very well maintained with lots of shade. I came across this sculpture titled “Bikes Forever” that contains 1254 bicycle frames.

Now I was starting to get a bit hot and tired and so stopped for an iced coffee at Alfred’s above the Austin rowing club. There was a very long line of people below waiting to rent canoes.

On Saturday night we walked over to the Violet Crown cinema (thanks to Shu for pointing it out to us) to see “Amazing Grace”, a documentary of the live recording of a gospel album by Aretha Franklin.

We really enjoyed the cinema – great food and drinks and a very nice feel. “What about the movie?”, I hear you asking. Well…I enjoyed it a lot and Diana enjoyed the first 15 minutes as well. Then she got a wee bit sleepy. The power and control that Franklin had at the height of her powers in 1972 is amazing.

Easter Sunday morning started with workouts and then Diana joined me for a walk along the river trail – this time on the South side. Much of the trail on this side is an elevated boardwalk style path that is very well done. The views back into downtown are quite impressive.

After a nice long walk, we stopped into Bennu for coffee and crosswords on the patio. Great location but the cacophony of bird squawking was almost unbearable.

We cleaned up and then walked across to Le Politique for Easter Sunday brunch. I really enjoyed my “Beef Cheek Presse” with a sunny side up egg, chickpeas and avocado. The beef cheek had a very rich and delicious flavour. We picked up a loaf at the patisserie next door to enjoy for dinner with some of the cheeses left over from Denny’s visit.

I think we did a good job of taking advantage of what Austin has to offer this week – music, outdoors, and food.

I enjoyed “The River” by Peter Heller this week. The main protagonists are Wynn and Jack, who have been best friends since freshman orientation, bonded by their shared love of mountains, books, and fishing. Wynn is a gentle giant, a Vermont kid never happier than when his feet are in the water. Jack is more rugged, raised on a ranch in Colorado where sleeping under the stars and cooking on a fire came as naturally to him as breathing. When they decide to canoe the Maskwa River in northern Canada, they anticipate long days of leisurely paddling and picking blueberries, and nights of stargazing and reading paperback Westerns. But a wildfire making its way across the forest adds unexpected urgency to the journey. When they hear a man and woman arguing on the fog-shrouded riverbank and decide to warn them about the fire, their search for the pair turns up nothing and no one. But, the next day a man appears on the river, paddling alone. Is this the man they heard? And, if he is, where is the woman? The story quickly pivots from a wilderness vacation adventure log to a harsh survival tale with several twists and turns.

You can tell Heller has spent significant time in the outdoors from his descriptions of nature. Here’s a passage that I particularly enjoyed describing animals fleeing the impending forest fire:

“The moose trotted to the open margin of the left riverbank and clattered over the broken shale on stiff legs and entered the water without pause, and she stretched her neck and let the water sweep her without concern and set a ferry angle and swam across. The calf mimicked the mother. They were only yards ahead of them. The next was a bull moose, and then a black bear with two cubs. The cubs hesitated at water’s edge, they seemed frightened, and the mama bear snorted and waded out of the river and got behind them and drove them forward. They swam. The littler one lost ground in the current and Wynn thought he would get swept away, but the mother got below him and bumped and shouldered and goaded him across.”

Riddle hint: Think of a wall clock

Still don’t get the riddle? The answer is at the end of the music section.

Here’s the orginal version of “Good Day for the Blues” by Storyville that I heard David Grissom perform on Tuesday evening. I think this is certainly one of his most popular and accessible compositions:

I really enjoy the sound of this song by a band that I heard for the first time this week and can’t remember where. The National Reserve have good vocals and a great guitar sound with nice production. They’re based in Brooklyn and have been playing a regular Friday night bar gig there for almost a decade before releasing their first album. Here’s how they describe themselves on their website, “Founded and fronted by singer-guitarist Sean Walsh, The National Reserve mine an archetypal musical seam, marrying gutbucket R&B, Laurel Canyon lyricism, New Orleans funk workouts, late night soul, and bluesy, boozy rock ‘n’ roll to create their own timeless brand of American music. ”

Samantha Rise is another artist just releasing her debut material. She claims to play “High Country Soul”. Again I like her vocals and the excellent guitar accompaniment on this song:

Let’s close out this week with some classic Bob Dylan as heard on the “Billions” TV show this week – I really do enjoy the musical choices for this show:

Mott the Hoople’s Greatest Hits has been one of my favourite albums for more than 35 years now. I also enjoy the Ian Hunter (lead singer for Mott) solo albums and have one in my collection that I bought on holiday in France with my Mum and Dad (it’s aging very well). The band reformed recently for a few shows. Here they are in Boston performing “Saturday Gigs” and “All the Young Dudes” (a song written by David Bowie and gifted to the band as they were trying to get started).

Riddle Answer: 4 am (I hear you groaning).

Should I make a riddle a regular feature in the blog?