Category: Travel

Week in Review – December 13, 2020

“Road Trip – Again”

The reprise of the road trip to California was scheduled to begin early on Friday morning and so we exchanged some gifts from under the tree on Thursday evening.  I’m always so impressed with Diana’s wrapping skills.  She got a special edition book of Winnie the Pooh stories and is looking forward to me reading bedtime stories from it.  I’m working on the voices – it seems like everyone sounds a bit like Eeyore.

The car was 90% packed up on Thursday night (including the fancy new Yeti champagne transporter) so that we could get a quick start on Friday morning.  We were underway by 9am and arrived in Albuquerque around 10 hours later.   The 645 miles in one day was just about as much as I can handle.  We did stop for a late lunch at the Drunken Oyster in Amarillo, and I couldn’t help but order the Cajun fondue that we enjoyed so much on the last road trip.  We made just one navigational error – a wrong turn just before arriving at the hotel – same one I almost missed last time.  Bit of a slow learner.

Saturday began with a walk across the hotel parking lot to the Marigold Café, a new place since our last trip.  It combines Indian and American foods with New Mexico influences in creative ways.  For example, my breakfast taco was served in fresh naan bread rather than a tortilla and included some delicious green chilis.  Diana’s avocado toast was also excellent and she raved about the bacon.  I’d like to return and sample the tikka mac ‘n cheese.

Our tummies pleasantly full, we made the short drive to Santa Fe.  We drove past downtown to the gorgeous and impressive Santa Fe Opera house just north of town.  The gate was closed and so we couldn’t get too close but the setting is really unique, with open air views of the high desert and mountains.  We were glad the snow came a few days prior to our visit so that we didn’t have that driving challenge.

After checking into the lovely, historic La Fonda hotel, we walked over to Canyon Road and had a ramble past all the art galleries and sculpture gardens that line the street.  I really enjoyed these wind machines – so creative and attention grabbing.

We walked back to the square and then enjoyed coffee and a slice of quiche at the hotel.  I was interested to see the red chilis hung as ornaments on the square.  Here’s the view from our hotel room balcony.  The cathedral bells are quite loud.  Fortunately the Trump rally (no masks in sight) in front of the cathedral cleared out quickly.

Why did we take the time to detour up to Santa Fe on an already long road trip you ask?  Very solid question.  Our friends Amy and Ray were getting married on Saturday evening at the La Fonda hotel.  We hadn’t planned on attending but couldn’t say no after Amy heard we were just going to be an hour away in Albuquerque.  Here’s Diana dressed up for the wedding with the favour that Amy left at the front desk – red chili peppers.

I hadn’t realized the ceremony was to be on the balcony of the bridal suite, in the evening, during a snow storm.  I was not dressed properly.  And certainly not for the extended event that the “celebrant” (artsy name for the lady presiding over the ceremony) insisted on presenting.  I swear that as the snow increased, she spoke slower.  There were several elongated descriptions of special parts – mixing sand together, the water ceremony etc.  My toes were quite iced up by the end.  The setting was lovely, and when we finally reached the exchange of vows, Amy and Ray were clearly very happy and did a great job.

Diana had the right idea when we made it back inside – thaw your hands on the chimney.

Here are a couple of other inside pictures.  I did have a jacket and tie on for the ceremony – first time in at least 10 months.

I particularly enjoyed meeting and chatting with Amy’s Dad Bob – what a fun character.  That and learning a new game, “Cheers to the Governor”, that the kids introduced.  I highly recommend it – you can find the rules online.  Diana and BP enjoyed getting their pictures taken on the snowy balcony when we went back downstairs.

We loaded up and headed out early on Sunday morning – destination Las Vegas – a mere 8 hours of driving away.  On the road by 8am and we should be relaxing at the lovely Aria hotel on the Vegas strip by 6pm or so.  All was smooth with some slow initial going on the snow in Santa Fe and the pace picking up when we merged onto the interstate down to Albuquerque.  And then everything changed – and not for the better.  There were multiple semi-truck accidents on I40 – we sat stopped on the highway amidst all the trucks for 2 hours straight at one point.

Thirteen very long and tedious hours later, we rolled up to Aria.  Vegas is so quiet that the restaurants have very reduced hours – we were lucky to grab a quick drink and bite at the Aria Pub.  The juxtaposition of the old, classic Santa Fe La Fonda with the huge, glitzy and modern Aria was quite dramatic.  The scale of the place comes through in this picture where the super cars out front look like models.

After our quick dinner, we walked down the strip to Bellagio and watched the fountain show with Christmas music.  Always such an impressive sight.  On the way we passed through a new and extremely upscale mall called “Crystals” something or other.  We were amazed at this tree where each ornament was one of the Swarovski crystal special editions – I hate to think how much it cost to decorate that tree.

Passing the smaller Eiffel tower at Paris hotel reminded us of a wonderful dinner we enjoyed there and of the very special 50th birthday dinner that we enjoyed with Mum and Dad at the real version in the real Paris.

Back at Aria, we relaxed with a cocktail at the “Lift Bar” and enjoyed a talented musician covering all kinds of music from different eras.  What a treat.

 

Upstairs BP was marveling at all the neon sights.  I hate to think about how much money these Vegas hotels are losing every hour with so few people around.

 

 

We finished listening to the Michael Connelly audio book of “The Law of Innocence” on the drive to Albuquerque.  It’s amazing how a good story, well read, can help the time pass.  There were just enough twists to keep our interest and not so many that it gets ridiculous – which seems to be the trend these days.  D kept picturing Matthew McConaughey in his role as the original “Lincoln Lawyer” as the story unfolded.

I didn’t make too much progress on “Utopia Avenue” this week, but am happy to report that my interest was held much better again.  I suspect I’ll finish the book off quickly on arrival in Pacifica as I get plenty of quiet reading time with Clorinda.

 

 

 

I heard the John Fogerty song “Broken Down Cowboy” on the Sirius Deep Tracks station on the drive.  I liked it a lot and was surprised that I hadn’t heard it before.  It’s not on Spotify but I did find this live version from the Royal Albert Hall:

“If I was a gambling man
Never would’a let you play that hand
With a broken down cowboy like me”

This Chuck Berry song came on while we were eating lunch at the Drunken Oyster in Amarillo – they played great music.  Quite different than his normal stuff:

An early Tom Waits song that Jesse covered on the Tuesday Night Supper Club show:

And finally, to recognize the 40th anniversary of John Lennon’s passing, one of my favourites.  I can remember pretty vividly walking to school with Drew Kirkland and David Smith the morning after the assassination and talking about how important Lennon’s contributions to music were.

Stay patient and safe.

 

Fortnight in Review – December 6, 2020

“Feast and Famine”

After a busy Thanksgiving weekend, this week was very quiet with our only real outing to downtown McKinney for coffee today.  Diana took my picture with the Xmas display outside the coffee shop.  Not quite a Christmas card since Diana and BP didn’t make it in.

Rewinding a fortnight (remember when we used to have to rewind VHS and audio cassettes?), we experienced a quite unexpected and very boisterous rain storm on Monday night:

Thanksgiving was a much more pleasant weather day.  We passed on cooking a turkey feast for two at home and headed to Perry’s steakhouse for a late lunch/early dinner.  Champagne and lobster tails make my McD very happy.

She said several times that the grilled lobsters were perfectly cooked.  A nicely cooked sea bass makes me happy.  So we were both very happy with our meals – and had plenty of leftovers for a late dinner.  I laughed when we checked in on the chaos at Amy and Adamo’s home and heard that Adamo had said, “maybe we can go out for lobster on Thanksgiving twenty years from now.”

We drove to Austin for the weekend on Friday morning, checked into the Intercontinental downtown (changing names to a Royal Sonesta the following week), and got ready for an early dinner at Peche – why not start out at one of our favourite Austin eateries.  We started with some very decadent escargots (no lack of butter or garlic) and then I had a delicious redfish on a bed of the barley risotto that I enjoy so much.  Diana had an equally decadent foie gras on grits.

After Peche, we walked across the street to the Parker Jazz Club (capacity reduced from over 100 to 30) and enjoyed our first live music in 9 months with 12 other folks.  Kris and the team are trying really hard to keep the place going with very limited seating weekend shows and live-streaming.  The house band was excellent as always – although the new drummer over plays too much for my liking.  Kris might have played almost all of his 8 or 9 instruments – going from bass flute to multiple saxophones and a flugelhorn.

Saturday was a rain day – light drizzle all day long.  That meant we couldn’t do our walk/run along the river and had to settle for the ellipticals in the hotel gym – surprised to find it open and we had it to ourselves.  We did walk down Congress Avenue for coffee and a TacoDeli treat before the workout.

Brunch was at the Odd Duck – one of my top three Austin brunch spots.  The shrimp and grits with a perfectly cooked deep fried egg were fabulous, as was the ceviche with green curry sauce.  It’s always so hard to choose from all the options – and the menu is new every time we go.  Diana loved their take on the Paloma cocktail.  I’m now expected to try and replicate that – oops, maybe she’d forgotten already and I just reminded her.

After lunch we made a visit to the office to drop off an old laptop that I’d been hanging on to for a while and then visited the Yeti flagship store next to our old apartment.  Diana was determined to purchase one of the ludicrously priced coolers that keep ice solid for several days.  Then a trip to Warby Parker to get our glasses adjusted.  What a productive afternoon.

I hadn’t made any plans for Saturday night and we decided we should revisit the Parker jazz club and make another donation towards trying to keep the joint open.  This time we had dinner as well, splitting a yummy burger.  There was a slightly larger audience but still nowhere near the reduced capacity.  Kris was in a New Orleans mood – which suited me just fine.  I was interested to hear him share that he and Ryan Davis (piano) had been playing together for over 20 years, including 14 as the house band at Eddie V’s steakhouse.

Sunday was a dry day and so we were able to execute a 4 mile circuit around the river trail, culminating with another snack at TacoDeli.  Then another excellent brunch at Suerte – my top ranked Mexican restaurant.  The masa that they make all the corn tortillas and tostadas from is ridiculously good.  Diana had a smoked salmon tostada and I tried the bacon and sweet potato tetela (like a corn based pie with bacon and sweet potato puree inside).  They were both perfect – particularly the mornay sauce, which I learned is a classic béchamel sauce enriched with a blend of Gruyère and Parmesan cheeses.  We have really missed the creative food that is so readily available in Austin.  And the great live music.

Diana was still a bit hungry after her tostada and so we had an excuse to get an order of the best tacos ever – the suaderos, and a side of sweet kolache.  Yum yum yum.  My tummy is wishing it was living back in Austin after revisiting all these food pictures.

After brunch we met our friend Neffie at Fixe – a new place she introduced us to that specializes in southern comfort food – supposedly the best biscuits (scones) in Austin.

 

 

We passed this sign on the walk to Fixe – so nice to be able to walk everywhere again.  My Mum had just been telling us the story of the Battle of Bannockburn where the English tried to sneak up on the Scots at night, taking their boots off for stealth, but were foiled by the thistles that made them yelp and awake the sleeping Scots.  And like a responsible Scotsman who payed attention in History class, I do indeed remember that happened in 1314.

Neffie kept us laughing until it was time for our concert at the Austin City Limits Moody theater.  It’s always fun to browse the pictures of the musical greats that have played there – from Edie Brickell to Ray Charles and everything in between.

Nicki Bluhm opened the show for the Band of Heathens (BoH) and had a much more impressive voice in person than we hear her on the Tuesday night livestreams.  She was able to effectively fill the theater with just her voice and acoustic guitar.  Here she is with her husband Jesse, the bass player for the BoH, performing the first song that Sonny and Cher ever did together:

This was the BoH 15th anniversary show in their hometown and they didn’t disappoint at all, with a great mixture of songs from their new album and classics.  “Miss Ohio” was an early favourite:

“Call Me Gilded” is a highlight from the new album and the harmonies are on good display:

And I’ll finish the reprise of this outstanding show with “Hurricane” transitioning into “LA County Blues”:

Three nights of fantastic live music.  What a long overdue treat.

We started Monday with another workout at the hotel and then made the drive back to boring old McKinney.  The rest of this week was our normal work from home routine, culminating with the aforementioned trip for coffee.  Our only other excitement was a trip to “Run-On” after coffee to get runner D fitted for some new shoes.  She’s been complaining of cold and numb toes and we’re trying to fix that with some new shoes and socks.  45 minutes later and I think she’s all fixed up – it’s nice that the store encourage you to go outside and run in the shoes they recommend.

I’ve been enjoying “Utopia Avenue” by David Mitchell (best known for “Cloud Atlas”).  The book is about a group of musicians who form a band in the late 60s and early 70s.  It started really well and is dragging a bit in the middle.  At almost 500 pages with 200 or so to go, I’m hoping it grabs my interest a bit more soon.  Although a work of fiction, famous musicians and other characters from real life make appearances in the book – sometimes entertaining and other times feeling pretty contrived – particularly in their dialogue.

I’ve come across a decent amount of music that is new to me over the last couple of weeks and I’ll save some for the upcoming posts.

I’ve always loved the song “Gypsy Blood” by Mason Ruffner and was interested to sample a more laid back recent offering.  Here’s what a review said: “If you were waiting for Mark Knopfler to score a Sundance entry set in Grand Isle, this is your lucky day.”  That caught my interest as I love Knopfler’s scores and Grand Isle is an area where Denny and the crew go fishing annually.

Some more reading provided this update on Ruffner’s activities since “Gypsy Blood” in the 80s:  “In the mid-’80s, after Sea-Saint and before The Big Easy, transplanted Fort Worth native Mason Ruffner was a welcome national focal point for the New Orleans scene, a guitar slinger equally adept at blues, country, Tex-Mex and jazz who fell in love with the Crescent City and, somewhat oddly, folded the town’s rich piano tradition into his music. He was a critic’s darling, but perhaps taking a cue from so many of his local heroes, he soon disappeared into the wilds south of Austin.”

The dobro sound on this one is perfect:

A Colin Lake song popped up on a playlist and I did some research on him also.  We saw him at the Telluride Blues Festival but I didn’t know much about him.  He’s spent the last few years sailing around Latin America.  Interesting to read this piece about Antigua – a beautiful and artsy town surrounded by volcanoes in Guatemala, where I enjoyed an afternoon right before COVID arrived to shut down travel.  “Once in Antigua, Guatemala, Colin found the change in atmosphere inspiring and picked up a few gigs around town.  While dusting off his catalog, he gleaned new and deeper meaning in the lines and melodies of his own songs, rediscovering them as though they were not his own.”

Stay safe and kind.

Week in Review – October 25, 2020

“Happy Birthday Clorinda”

When I left you last Sunday, we were sporting our “Flu Fighter” band-aids.  Diana added her “I Voted” sticker in the afternoon and reported that the line to vote at the fire station was short when she arrived a few minutes before the early voting opened.

On Monday I managed to work a haircut and swim into a relatively busy day of work, then settled into watch the Cowboys in the evening.  Even Campbell turned the game off at half time because they played so poorly.  I got all set up to watch the game in California today and was again treated to a very disappointing performance.

We boarded our first plane in eight months on Thursday – making the flight from Dallas to San Francisco to help Clorinda celebrate her 89th birthday.  We didn’t get off to a good start with an hour delay to change a tire, but after that the flight was fine, albeit a bit stressful to be around so many people after living mostly at home for so many months.

I met Will for Chinese food at Yat Sing in Redwood city – home of the best pot stickers in town on Friday.  They were very tasty – particularly when dipped in the special combination of sauces that Will recommended.

We sat outside and caught up on what’s going on in Will and Christine’s lives.  Pending new puppy, looking at engagement rings, researching houses to buy, and a special photo shoot of his BMW in a music video production studio were among the various interesting topics.  And he even paid for lunch.  It’s lovely to see him doing so well and enjoying life.  We got so involved in the conversation that I completely forgot to take a selfie of ourselves rather than just the dumplings.

The weather in Pacifica was terrific for our visit as you can see from these outdoor pictures of Clorinda and family enjoying her birthday on Saturday.

Was it Andy or Jude who said something funny?
Still funny?

Andy and Jude (Clorinda’s wonderful neighbours) won the most creative card award.  This is a picture of Clorinda and accompanist from around 60 years ago.  Andy made a mask for the accompanist from the same material as her dress – very nice detailed work.

I think Clorinda enjoyed sitting talking to and watching her newest grand-daughter, Francesca, more than anything else.  She’s such a good and happy baby – Amy certainly deserved that third time around.

 

 

 

I watched the movie “Parasite” by Korean director Bong Joon-ho during my elliptical sessions this week.  The film won the Cannes Palme D’Or and the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2019.  It’s described as a “black comedy thriller” and I really enjoyed the creativity and cleverness of the first half, before it got a bit silly and violent.

“Remember My Name”, Cameron Crowe’s documentary about David Crosby was my companion for part of the flight to San Francisco.  Incredibly well done and very sad as Crosby recounts his struggles with demons that caused him to spend time in jail and destroy wonderful friendships with Graham Nash, Stephen Stills, and Neil Young.  His enduring love for creating music is the big redeeming factor.

Kenny (New Orleans Fire Department Station Chief) recommended “The Cooperating Witness” by Mike Avery, a friend of his who now lives in New Orleans.  Interestingly Kenny is currently working on a memoir of his 30 years on the NOFD.  I suspect there are going to be some very compelling stories in there, including the months when he lived at the fire house during Hurricane Katrina.  Here’s a little bit about Michael Avery from his website:

“Beginning in 1970, Michael enjoyed a career as a civil rights and criminal defense attorney over four decades, representing clients in jury trials and arguing cases in federal and state appellate courts, including the United States Supreme Court. His principal specialty was law enforcement misconduct. Michael and a team of lawyers obtained the largest award ever against the FBI for wrongful convictions, securing damages of $102 million for the families of four innocent men who were framed on murder charges by the Bureau. In 1998, he joined the faculty of Suffolk Law School in Boston, where he was a tenured professor, teaching Constitutional Law, Evidence, and related courses. In 2014 Suffolk awarded him the status of professor emeritus.”

Back to the story.  Suffolk Law student Susan Sorella is tending tables at her father’s restaurant in Boston’s North End when the head of the local mob pays her a surprise visit. What he tells her sends her on a mission to save an innocent man accused of gunning down the mob’s accountant.

Susan’s an intern for Bobby Coughlin, a burned-out defense attorney who pleas his clients out faster than they can sign his retainer agreement. The judge, having dropped the accused trigger man in Bobby’s lap, is pushing for a quick guilty plea. Bobby wants to supply it before he has a nervous breakdown.

Susan has to battle Bobby’s fear of failure, his sexism, the State’s Attorney, crooked FBI agents, their homicidal informants, and a cooperating witness to get to the truth. She’s not a lawyer yet, but with her knack for digging up evidence and the wise guys on her side, she’s racing to get to the truth before an innocent man goes to jail.

I didn’t see the twist in the tail of this book coming at all – always a nice surprise.  The descriptions of the Italian restaurants and food in the North End of Boston were some of my favourite parts of this book.

“Bostonians come from all over the city to the North End to eat.  Walking down Hanover Street, one finds a restaurant every hundred feet.  There’s always a line of people waiting to buy cannoli outside Mike’s Pastry.  Those who want to buy Italian specialties to enjoy at home step into Salumeria Italiana for prepared meats, olives and olive oil, salted anchovies, fresh sun-dried tomato pesto, and similar delicacies.  Several times a year the streets are taken over by people celebrating the feast of one or another Catholic Saint”

Susan describes strolling the North End with Romano, the mob boss:

“Romano took her elbow and they walked out to Hanover Street.  The North End was his domain.  It was like walking through medieval Florence with one of the Medici.  Romano was a prince of this city, a modern student of Machiavelli.  All the familiar coffee shops and neighborhood restaurants looked different with him at her side – smaller, less independent.”

I recommend this fast paced criminal mystery, made all the more believable by Avery’s first hand experiences.

The other book that I enjoyed this week was “Chinaberry Sidewalks” by Rodney Crowell, a singer songwriter raised in dirt poor conditions in Houston in the 1950s and 60s.  I’ve enjoyed his music and the albums he produced for Rosanne Cash and others for several years, and enjoyed his memoir a lot.

In the first chapter, Crowell describes Hurricane Carla and his father’s disdain for preparations:

“My father’s admiring his newly resuscitated television when a news bulletin announces the impending arrival of Hurricane Carla.

This sends Jacinto City residents into a frenzy of preparation.  Masking-tape crosses appear in windows, sheets of plywood seal up screened porches, new batteries make old transistor radios work just fine.  Everybody stocks up on food and water, blows cobwebs off kerosene lanterns, and replenishes liquor supplies.  So many people scurrying around in a frenzy reminds me of the Ant Farm Mrs. Cain keeps in the back of her fifth-grade classroom.

Such fastidiousness offends my father’s sensibilities and is as unlike him as being a bird-watcher.  He dismisses his conscientious neighbors as a nervous pack of limp-wristed do-gooders.  Lighting up a Pall Mall and spitting tobacco strands from the tip of his tongue, he scoffs, “Aw, hell, I ain’t afraid of no hurricane.  It can blow the dang roof off for all I care.”

A similar disdain for preparation will become the hallmark of my adult life, winging it at all costs my Achilles’ heel and “damn the torpedoes” my battle cry.”

Talking about his father’s immense inventory of memorized songs:

“The Saturday night Grand Old Opry on a neighbor’s dry-cell radio, local barn dances, his own father’s front-porch performances – that was the extent of his access to popular music.  But lack of exposure to the outside world did nothing to hamper his ability to accrue words and music.  He possessed an ability to absorb songs from the atmosphere.  If he heard a song once, he new it forever.  Such was his gift.”

Alicia appears to have a very similar gift of memorizing lyrics and music on a first listen.

Kenny had just texted me a report on his fishing trip with Denny, letting me know he was now “Mr. Exotic” because of the large alligator gar he had caught, when I read this passage:

“As a river fisherman, Sherman Buck was unrivaled.  He could drag alligator gar and catfish as long as your leg out of a dry creek bed.”

alligator gar example

The memoir is mainly about Crowell’s early life – up to finishing high school – but does include a fast forward to the deaths of his mother and father.  A very sweet portion at the very end of the book:

“The impulse to try to sculpt a narrative out of my family’s history started when I remembered introducing my mother to Roy Acuff backstage at the Grand Ole Opry in 1991.  Identifying herself as a lifelong fan, she told the most popular country musician of her generation that she’d met the love of her life at his concert in the Buchanan High School gymnasium, obliging everyone present, myself included, to imagine this had taken place only a night or two before.  The courtly superstar paid rapt attention and then said his most treasured memory from that evening was of two young lovebirds whose faces shone from the audience with the light of love everlasting.  The meeting lasted no more than three minutes, but I wish it could’ve gone on forever.  My mother floated out of Mer. Acuff’s dressing room, an eighteen-year-old girl again.”

Let’s start out the musical section with something from Rodney Crowell.  You can’t go wrong with any of his albums but I prefer those from the last 10 years or so:

Some Puccini for Clorinda.  She was translating the story for me as we listened to this:

I read about Hall Willner and his tribute albums, which led me to these great T. Rex covers on his “Angelheaded Hipster” album:

Willner also produced Lucinda Williams’ “West” album that includes Bill Frisell (of surprise C-Boys jazz guitar performance) and Jim Keltner on drums:

Stay safe and calm – it’s likely to get a bit crazy in the next few weeks.

 

 

 

 

Fortnight in Review – October 18, 2020

“Vacation’s over”

It’s been a while since we took as many consecutive days off and completely unplugged from work.  What a pleasant vacation with good friends and a beach for Diana.  After a 1700 mile round trip we’re back at work again.

When I last left you this is what I reported:

“We’re currently debating where to go for brunch and Saints game watching.  No firm conclusions have been reached.  It’s a process with Anne involved.”

We ended up deciding on a new restaurant, Treps, from the owners of Cafe Amelie.  On arrival, the wait was going to be a long one.  No worries, Clesi’s next door was serving delicious gulf oysters for the ladies (Denny was on soccer duty).  Look at the size of some of those oysters.

Laura met us at Trep’s for the second course – I enjoyed a really good beet salad (so good I ate a good portion before taking a picture) and some of a cochon du lait sandwich.  We had plenty of leftovers.

We started off Monday in New Orleans with a nice walk in Audobon park.  The trail round the park is 1.8 miles long and we managed two laps, enjoying the very old live oak trees along the way.  The trail was busy but most folks were consciously keeping their distance.

Having worked up a good appetite, I thought we’d try some tapas for lunch at Baru on Magazine street.   Although their website confirmed they were open, Baru was fully closed.  Plan B – the Rum House just down the street for some salad and Caribbean tacos.  Foiled again – under a complete remodel but offering counter service next door.  Diana suggested The Vintage champagne and coffee bar across the street and we enjoyed a good lunch on the sidewalk.

We took advantage of New Orleans restaurant week, where many places offer reduced prix fixe meals, for dinner at La Petite Grocery – one of our favourites with consistently good food.    I enjoyed crab bisque, Parisian gnocchi, and butterscotch pudding.  The pudding has been on their menu for over 10 years for good reason – served like a pot du creme with excellent flavour.  Diana ordered from the regular menu and loved her steak tartare and scallops.  Such a nice treat to enjoy a fabulous meal with Denny and Anne.

On Tuesday we enjoyed an impromptu visit from Kenny (Fire Chief for one of the nearby stations) and then started our drive to the Florida panhandle in the afternoon.  We drove through Mississippi and Alabama – two states that we don’t think either of us has spent any time in previously – stopping for dinner in Mobile, Alabama.  Arrival at the house in Florida was around 7pm.

Denny, as usual, selected a very comfortable house for us, with spacious front and rear patios and modern kitchen and bathrooms.  The master bathroom reminded us quite a bit of our remodel – I’m sure it wasn’t anywhere near as complex to accomplish.

 

Wednesday began with breakfast tacos with chorizo and a trip to the local beach in the morning.  On the way back from the beach we all rented bikes at Big Daddy’s for easy transportation to and from the beach (parking was very limited) and then Diana and I made a run to Publix (local grocery store chain) for dinner supplies.  We cooked up chicken fajitas on the grills at the expansive common area by the community pool.

Thursday was very much a repeat of Wednesday but we ventured further down the beach for even better privacy and spacing and stayed longer.  The ocean was starting to get quite choppy from the impact of Hurricane Delta further east in the gulf.  The undertow was getting pretty severe.

On Friday we drove to Grayton Beach state park – this is where the New Orleans krewe typically stays in cabins (not available this year).  The beach here was lovely and extended for miles in both directions.

After Grayton Beach we drove into Seaside for lunch at a taco stand.  This is an interesting town that was built as a master planned community in 1981.  All the houses are very similar and the place has a kind of Stepford Wives feel to it – all very perfect.

The Truman show movie was filmed here, taking advantage of the sameness.

Friday dinner was steaks on the community area grill – perfectly cooked by Thom and Alex.

Saturday was a rain day and so we were treated to lots of loud poker and other card games at the house.

The weather cleared up on Sunday and we spent the morning at Goat Feathers beach – I’m not sure that’s the official name but the access is beside the Goat Feathers seafood shop and so that’s what it’s called by the krewe.  The sea continued to be very choppy with double red flags indicating nobody should even think about going on.  Denny picked up some lovely fresh shrimp there and made an excellent pasta to go with them.  He’s such a great cook and makes it look so easy.

Monday was a driving day – from Florida back to New Orleans.  We arrived around 3pm and were able to meet up with Kenny and Kara, and later Denny and Anne, for a snack at Val’s, a new Mexican restaurant that is very similar to Suerte in Austin.  They server street tacos and other authentic Mexican fare. The elotes (corn on the cob with “fixin’s”) are delicious.

After that snack, I picked up some pizza from Midway just down Freret Street and we settled into the Webster Street couches to watch the Saints on Monday Night Football.

The 1725 mile round trip concluded on Tuesday with an uneventful drive from New Orleans back to McKinney.  I was pretty tired by lunch time on Wednesday.

I took Diana on a very exciting date this morning.  We got our annual flu shots.  I heard something about “placating me and Alicia”.

You might remember that I shared a video of Damon’s cousin’s parrot performing Stairway to Heaven with him a few months ago.  Well, that parrot and cousin made it on to the Kelly Clarkson show last week.  Quite funny.

https://www.facebook.com/515208202285132/posts/1030026964136584/?vh=e&extid=RGFSc82AYcG1CzCn

I was very optimistic about my reading on vacation – I packed five books, thinking that a book every two days seemed about right with all that free time.  I only finished one book – “The Yellow House” by Sarah M. Broom.

This is a memoir of Broom’s life so far, she’s 36 and spent her childhood and much of her adulthood in New Orleans.  The story starts with her grandmother and continues on through her 11 siblings and their time in New Orleans East, growing up in the “Yellow House” – a much touted new part of the city that never really took off and has become very rundown over the years.

I enjoyed some portions of this book much more than others.  The multi-generational first portion about Broom’s grandmother, mother and siblings dragged a bit.  When she shifts to her early adulthood, world travels, and ultimately her family’s experience with Hurricane Katrina, my interest was much bettered captured.

Here are some of the portions that stood out to me and were “dog eared”:

The quote on the first page of this book does a great job of summing up the driving force of this enlightening memoir:

“The things we have forgotten are housed.

Our soul is an abode and by remembering houses and rooms,

we learn to abide within ourselves.”    Gaston Bachelard.

Broom describes her maternal grandfather while at the same time skillfully sharing much of the Louisiana history:

“Lionel Soule was descended from free people of color; his antecedents included a French slave-owner, Valentin Saulet, who served as a lieutenant in the colonial French administration during the city’s founding days.  Having a French or Spanish ancestor confirmed your nativeness in a city colonized by the French for forty-five years, ruled by the Spanish for another forty, then owned again by the French for twenty days before they sold it to America in 1803, a city where existed as early as 1722 a buffer class, neither African and slave nor white and free, but people of color who often owned property – houses, yes, but sometimes also slaves, at a time in America when the combination of “free” and “person of color” was a less-than-rare concept.”

Describing New Orleans East and the NASA factory – something I hadn’t heard about until reading here.  Interestingly we drove through New Orleans East for the first time on our way to the Florida panhandle – nothing much to see there for sure.

“It was called a “Model City…taking from within an old and glamorous one” that if successful would have made New Orleans “the brightest spot in the South, the envy of every land-shy community in America.”   And then, too, it was the space age.  Men were blasting off; the country electrified by the Apollo missions and the thought of explorations to come.  Few Americans knew that the rocket boosters for the first stage of the Saturn launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida, were constructed in NASA’s New Orleans East facilities, in the Michoud neighborhood, where my father, Simon Broom, worked and his son Carl would later work.”

An interesting musical tidbit:

“That September of the move, in 1964, the Beatles came to town.  The Congress Inn was nothing special.  But it was a place where fewer fans might converge and it if was damaged, no one would care.  This motel would not suffer as might the Roosevelt Hotel downtown, which had begged Beatles management to cancel the group’s reservation there.”

Describing the start of the torrent of bad decision making that would ultimately result in the devastation of Hurricane Katrina:

“Soon after it was built in 1956, the environmental catastrophe that the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MR-GO) wrought would become evident.  Ghost cypress tree trunks stood up everywhere in the water like witnesses, evidence of vanquished cypress forests.  The now unrestrained salt water that flowed in from the Gulf would damage surrounding wetlands and lagoons, and erode the natural storm surge barrier protecting low-lying places like New Orleans East.  This is what happened during Hurricane Betsy: one-hundred-plus-mile-per-hour winds blew in from the east.”

A horrifying detail of class war during the Hurricanes:

“People in the deluged areas recalled hearing dynamite, an eruption in the middle of their scrambling.  “The levees were blown on purpose,” my brother Michael says.  Levees had been below before by the federal government, during the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 to divert water away from more “valuable” neighborhoods.”

A much more extreme version of my experience on getting my first eyeglasses at the age of 20:

“When I am then, my mother discovers that I cannot see beyond a hand in front of my eyes.  I have been acting a clown in school to distract form this  nonsight.  The children sitting all around me are annoying blurs, the chalkboard black waters with scratches of white.

“Trees have leaves.”

According to Mom this is the first thing I say the moment I can see.”

As the “Yellow House” falls more and more into disrepair:

“To describe the house fully in its coming apart feels maddening, like trying to pinpoint the one thing that ruins a person’s personality.

It seems to me now that as the house became more and more unwieldy, my mother became more emphatic about cleaning.  Mom’s cleanings were exorcisms.  At the core of her scrubbings was her belief in meritocratic tropes.  That hard work paid off, for instance.”

A reminder that the city of New Orleans has never been a particularly safe place:

“One of 424 murders in 1994.  Tourism rose.”

A detail that made me smile.  Denny’s high school prom was held at the Court of Two Sisters and he can’t remember the name of his date:

“Just at the moment when Lynette was hired at the Court of Two Sisters restaurant on Royal Street, she was accepted into Parsons School of Design and left for New York City.”

A harsh description of her brothers trying in the only way they know to bring some discipline to another brother who is struggling with addiction and stealing from the family:

“It is a terrible thing to see love misfire in a million different directions: we are beating you because you did a wrong thing as a grown man, because you hurt our mother who we love more than anything, because we can beat sense into you and addictions out of you even though of course we cannot, because if we do not beat you someone else will beat you to death and this will destroy us, too.”

More on the addicted brother, Darryl:

“I was afraid to look at Darryl in his possession, which is how I thought of his addiction.  I did not look at him, had never truly seen is eyes.  When I did, many years later, his was a face I had never seen before.

For the longest time, I couldn’t bear to hear his voice.  This is such a difficult thing to write, to be that close to someone who you cannot bear to look at, who you are afraid of, who you are worried will hurt you, even inadvertently, especially because you are his family and you will allow him to get away with it.”

Katrina strikes and two of the brothers have stayed behind and are camped out on the roof of the “Yellow House”.  Can you believe they sat on that roof for 7 days before rescue?:

“CARL

We new they was coming but you go to getting mad anyway.

From the roof where he sat, Carl could see the staging area on the interstate where the rescued were dropped off.  The airboats came straight through the area where before you could see a fence, where before you could see a car dealership and the train depot where freights docked for loading.

This new Old World seemed boundless.

They finally come get us, some white guys from Texas.  They pulled up in an airboat to the pitch of the roof.

Seven days had gone by.”

Having survived the storm, the next blow to the family  – the city deemed the “Yellow House” in “imminent danger of collapse” and bulldozed it:

“My mother, Ivory Mae, called me one day in Harlem and told me the story in three lines:

Carl said those people then came and tore our house down.

That land clean as a whistle now.

Look like nothing was ever there.“

Broom take s a volunteer job in Burundi and is amazed at the local popularity of Phil Collins:

“At first I thought the driver played him to make me feel comfortable hearing a language I new, but Phil blared from rolled-down car windows everywhere and would be sung on karaoke nights from stages where live bands performed covers.  The men who worked for Alexis were singing along now, too.  People here loved Phil Collins.  By the end, I would like him, too.”

Broom takes a job in communications for Major Ray Nagin after Katrina.  I once bumped into Nagin at a pizza restaurant on St Charles avenue:

“Nagin had survived the Water.  He could say, I stayed.  I was here.  his not leaving meant: I am one of you.  That was a Purple Heart in a city where outsiderness is never quite trusted.  Before the storm, New Orleans had the highest proportion of native-born residents of an American city – seventy-seven percent in 2000, which meant that only a small fraction of New Orleanians every left for elsewhere.  This was why the mass displacement meant so much.”

An anecdote about sitting on the balcony of her St. Louis street apartment and watching the goings on below:

“They told the story of how, in 2006, during the Tennessee Williams Festival screaming contest when Stanleys compete to yell “Stella” best and loudest, the winner that year yelled “FEMA!” instead.”

As Broom is deep into research on the father she never knew:

“My father is six pictures.  There is my father playing the banjo, with Lynette in the frame; my father at a social and pleasure club ball with grandmother Lolo; my mother sitting on my father’s lap; my father walking Deborah down the aisle; my father in a leather coat and black fedora, sitting at a bar with uncle Joe, raising a beer, mouth open, saying something to the picture taker; and my youngish father standing in front of an old Ford, pointing his finger at the camera’s eye.”

Road Home is the organization that compensated residents when they acquired their land and bulldozed their houses.  It took 11 years for Broom’s mother to receive any of the money:

“Eleven years after the Water, Road Home finally settled our case.  Too much time had passed to claim victory.”

On the music front, I’ve had time to listen to a lot of new music but won’t go overboard all at once in this post.  I’m listening to “Africaine” by Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers as I write this – such a great album that I forget about.

Here’s a new artist that I discovered on the trip – Tim Laughlin is Kenny’s cousin and performs a regular show from his balcony in the French Quarter.  I really enjoy a good clarinet performance:

Here’s a piece by Alice Coltrane, John Coltrane’s wife, that I found in a book called “One Last Song” by Mike Ayers.  The premise is asking a bunch of artists what the last song they would like to hear would be.  This one was chosen by Julia Holter.  I love the soothing repetition:

Lastly, I’ve been enjoying listening to some of the thousands of Grateful Dead archive concerts.  Here’s my favourite version of “Sugaree” so far.  Quite different than most of the others:

Stay safe and kind.  This is not nearly over yet.

Week in Review – June 14, 2020

“Road Trip – Week 3”

It was time to head home to McKinney on Monday.  Tower 23 (named after the nearest life guard tower) served us very well for overnight accommodation on Sunday – thanks D for organizing such a great room and view.  Konos surf bar right next door fixed us up with an amazing breakfast burrito – easily enough for a family – and coffee for the road.  We took the southern border route to Flagstaff, Arizona.  This gave plenty of opportunity to observe the much touted border wall.  The VW Passat did a great job of making the climbs up to 7,000 feet and back down.

We checked into the Flagstaff Marriott Courtyard (looked more like a ski lodge) in the early evening and enjoyed some Grimaldi’s pizza and salad delivered to the hotel.

Tuesday was our long driving day.  We had one fun stop just off Interstate 40 and the old Route 66 in Winslow, Arizona.  You may have heard the Eagles/Jackson Browne song “Take it Easy”, with the third verse:

“Now I’m a-standin’ on the corner in Winslow, Arizona
With such a fine sight to see
It’s a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed Ford
Slowin’ down to have a look at me”

It turns out that corner is well celebrated with a park, statues, live music and exhibits.

They even have a flat bed Ford parked alongside (no girl inside):

The audio book of “Where the Crawdads Sing” kept us company as we traversed the mountains, mesas, and then wide, flat open spaces to Amarillo.  We were most certainly road weary on arrival at the downtown Courtyard – this one is part of the “historic” collection and is a remodeled downtown bank building.  It certainly has a lot more character than most.  Only in this kind of rural location can you stay in a corner suite with wrap around windows for $102.

Do you see that smoke detector way up there?

With only 5.5 hours of driving left on Wednesday, we were able to enjoy a more leisurely start.  The local breakfast taco joint got us set up with breakfast and we were off on the road again.  We made it to the house around 6pm to the beeping sound of a smoke detector.  Diana located it in my office – the worst possible location as it’s 20 feet up and set back from the wall.  Thankfully she’s a lot more stable and agile at the top of the ladder than I am and soon had the battery replaced.  I think I read somewhere recently about 10 year life smoke detector batteries – but we didn’t have any of those on hand and would have gone nuts from the beeping before they arrived.

After that excitement, the only chores left were to put water in the pool and replace a broken sprinkler head – all the full joys of home ownership and leaving town for a while.

We had been looking forward to having Wash and Zoe, and their owners Brad and Jocelyn, come and visit us for a while.  They arrived on Friday evening and stayed with us overnight, leaving late Saturday afternoon.

You can see Wash and Zoe, named after characters in some sci-fi series, are a couple of gorgeous Irish Wolfhounds.  After checking out every room on arrival, they settled right in for the stay.  We took them for a walk up to Zin Zen after dinner and can see how much work it is to own such beasts – a constant stream of folks asking what kind of dogs they were.  Here’s a couple of shots to give perspective on just how large they are:

Thankfully they are a couple of very sweet and gentle giants.  It was so nice to have company for the first time in 4 months.  And I think I have clearance to order one up.

Will was busy taking pictures of his car and then “photo sphere dream weaving them” with some fancy AI software to make these great images.  Apparently he takes 5 to 10 individual pictures and weaves them together to create these.  Quite the artist.

 

My book on the road trip was “All Adults Here” by Emma Straub.  This is a very enjoyable ensemble family drama, set in small town Connecticut.  Three generations of Stricks play out their lives in quite different fashions, and it’s all very enjoyable and engaging.

“The older Astrid got, the more she understood that she and her parents and she and her children were as close as people could be, that generations slipped away quickly, and that the twenty-five years in between her and her mother and the thirtyish years in between  her and her children were absolutely nothing, that there were still people who had lived through the Holocaust, which had happened less than a decade before she was born, but which her children had read about in their history textbooks.  It happened before you could blink.  Her children had been children, and now they were adults; they were all adults here, now.”

Some music that I enjoyed on the trip.  First a classic Rory Gallagher blues boogie:

Then something completely different from the inimitable Muscle Shoals musicians:

And finally some classic Texas driving music:

Please remain patient and kind with everyone!

 

Week in Review – June 7, 2020

“Road Trip – Week 2”

The Pacifica Rockaway Beach Holiday Inn Express was our office for calls on Monday.  Fortunately our room had a nice balcony overlooking the Pacific Ocean and a changing collection of surfers.  That meant that one of us could conduct business from outside with the crashing waves as a backing track, while the other worked from inside.  I enjoyed watching the different skill levels and strategies of the surfers.  The 60 degree temperature and view were certainly a change from our back patio in McKinney.  Just what we needed.

There was an issue with Clorinda’s hot water heater that Marco was in charge of remedying.  He tried to enlist friends to assist with the replacement – this was unsuccessful but one friend did recommend the Vietnamese sandwiches from Dinosaur’s.  I filed that away and we ordered a variety of those for lunch on Monday.  We sat outside and enjoyed these on Amy and Adamo’s patio.  My portobello was delicious.

Lunch was a bit boisterous as Luciano and Massimo competed to see who could be the least safe on a new see-saw toy that Any bought for them.  What was she thinking?  I can’t imagine a worse choice for those two monsters.

A typical Campagna project spun up on Monday afternoon – we need to replace the 20+ year old water heater that has started leaking.  Adamo refused to help, reserving just the right to criticize and boss Marco around.  Diana and Marco headed off to Home Depot and came back with a new heater, faucet and various other supplies.  We left Marco and his supervisor to it and headed up the hill to Andy and Jude’s for Happy Hour.

Here’s an entertaining video of Marco “Sparky” going through his water heater installation checklist:

What a joy to be in a quiet environment with calm people!  They were great hosts as usual and showed us videos of the resident mountain lion and cub playing in their fountain.  The wildlife on Gypsy Hill has expanded quite a bit over the last year – deer were the main attraction but now we have added bobcats, mountain lions, and wild turkeys.  Really, seven wild turkeys were congregated outside Clorinda’s kitchen window on Monday afternoon.  I understand they peck at the glass pretty relentlessly – doesn’t seem like very “wild” behaviour.

We enjoyed a lovely sunset from Clorinda’s patio.

It’s always sad to watch the continued decline of Diana’s first car – such a pretty Fiat Spyder.  I’m afraid it’s beyond restoration hope at this point.

Diana went up on “The Hill” to supervise the plumber on Tuesday morning – he was reviewing Marco’s water heater installation, installing a new kitchen faucet and fixing a sink.  I stayed back at the hotel to get some meetings and work done.  It was a warmer morning and so I was able to sit on the balcony and enjoy the surf show during my calls.

Dinner was takeout sushi from Go Sushi.  Fortunately they had a chicken curry on the menu for me – it was actually very good.  Clorinda and I ate outside with the boys and the see-saw made it’s way into the proceedings again.

I got to babysit Francesca for a while and enjoy the sunset – such a happy baby.  Very pleased with her penguin dummy.

The wildlife show continued with a young deer checking out the parked cars.

Adamo shared some of his delicious lobsters with us for dinner on Thursday night and then it was time to get packed up for the continuation of the road trip.

On Friday we drove down to San Luis Obispo (home of Cal Poly where Will studied Mechanical Eng) with a brief stop to see Will at his office in the afternoon.  It was entertaining to see his face when one of his co-workers told him “Your Dad’s here” – not what he was expecting at all.  Will gave us a tour of the school that he’s remodeling and then we were on our way south.

Alicia brought us dinner to our hotel and we had a nice early night.  Diana was up and looking for a running location on Saturday.  Alicia suggested Shell beach on the north end of Pismo and that seemed to work out well.

Diana let me know that she could easily live there and had found some nice bungalows just off the beach.  Maybe she forgot about California taxes and the elevated prices of absolutely everything.  Turns out she was trying to find a compromise in our retirement destination desires – cooler weather for me and a beach for her.  Not entirely out of the realm of possibility but a serious long shot.

After D’s morning exercise, we drove to Alicia’s house for breakfast.  She made us some amazing Bloody Mary’s with crispy bacon stirrers and avocado toast – definitely becoming quite the hostess.

Saturday afternoon was spent with John and Madi at their home in Arroyo Grande.  Ben and Lilly provided some great entertainment – they’re such good kids.  Ben is an excellent baseball player for a 3 year old.  Can you see the focus on his face as Mama D pitches to him?

John grilled up brisket and ribs and we had a lovely meal outside.  I sat down inside to relax after dinner and was quickly joined by the kids looking for me to read some stories.  Ben was almost asleep by book number three.  Overall a very pleasant day on the California central coast.

Sunday took us on down the coast to Pacific Beach in San Diego to meet up with Campbell and Molly.  Diana found an excellent hotel room for us on the beach at a boutique hotel called Tower 23.  The balcony had a great view of all the action on the beach.

 

Campbell and Molly came over and joined us on the balcony for a while before we went downstairs for dinner at the Jordan restaurant in the hotel.  Then they came back upstairs to watch the last of the sunset.  I really enjoyed Molly telling us that, having to much time listening to Campbell’s sales pitches and follow up, she could easily tell the story for him.  I particularly enjoyed her rendition of “and what have you” – something I say quite a bit.

As Molly’s sister was arriving to drive them home, we experienced our first live protest march.  All very peaceful.

Whew!  Another busy week but so nice to spend time with everyone.

 

 

Week in Review – May 31, 2020

“Road Trip!”

My fancy new kettle arrived on Monday.  It allows me to heat water to the perfect temperature for my fancy new cafetiere – 96 degrees, and also features a “goose-neck” spout for precision pouring.  I know people in Guatemala who take the art of preparing coffee way more seriously than this – they have three different setups for different styles of coffee.  So I’m not that nuts at least.

 

Damon managed to send my gifts to himself and so the replacements arrived on Monday.  Very funny.

I read today that the New York Public Library has published a Spotify playlist of New York sounds.  Apparently residents are getting increasingly anxious because of the lack of street noise.  It’s called “Missing Sounds of New York” and here’s “Romancing Rush Hour”:

My rescheduled dental cleaning was on Tuesday.  I got a full set of x-rays and a very good report out.  The hygienist said I was her easiest patient of the morning.  Don’t think I’ve heard that before and good to hear at least some small part of me is holding up well.

We passed Tuesday evening in typical fashion with live streams from Hayes Carll and the Band of Heathens.  Check out the “Big Lebowski” movie inspired version of Dylan’s “The Man in Me” that they put together – excellent stuff.

The album featured on the Supper Club this week was Miles Davis’ “Kind of Blue”.  This choice was inspired by the death of Jimmy Cobb, the drummer and last surviving member from the group that recorded this 1957 classic – one of my very favourites and an album that never gets old after hundreds of playings.  It was also mentioned that Levon Helm celebrated his birthday on Tuesday.  I texted with Denny about that and he reminded me of us seeing him together at Jazzfest – that was when I first heard Stanton Moore on drums.  Levon left his drum kit to sing up front and I asked Denny who the excellent drummer was that took over.  It was nice to see the musicians again after my private birthday show.  Gordy did another great take on “Hurricane” by Levon Helm:

Alicia turned 20 on Wednesday and we hosted a Zoom call for friends and family to celebrate.  PCD, Lisa and Renee all joined from Australia, along with family and friends from around the US.  The call was lovely with everyone sharing stories and thoughts about Alicia.  In the aftermath of all that love, Diana was quite depressed about not seeing her Mum or daughter any time soon.  In a weak moment I suggested that we could always drive to visit them.  This suggestion was well received and a few minutes later McD indicated that she could be ready to leave at 9:40am on Thursday morning.  Yes – that is a very precise time.  Apparently calculated from the time a meeting ended plus a few minutes to get organized.  And the road trip was on!

As you can see, this is no short Sunday drive.  We planned to take about 2.5 days and arrive in time for a barbecue being hosted in Pacifica for Alicia’s birthday on Saturday afternoon.  After a delayed start, we made it to Amarillo for an early dinner.  Diana did an excellent job of selecting a restaurant with an outdoor patio.  The Drunken Oyster is a relatively new place done up to look like a classic New Orleans joint.  We started with a fondue that included andouille sausage and seafood.  It was absolutely delicious and well presented.  That was followed by a very pretty but chewy and tasteless kale salad (deducted from the bill), and a very tasty steak and scallops special.  Who knew Amarillo had such good dining options?  Nicely done D!

With our tummies full it was time to embark on the 4 hour leg over to Albuquerque and a bed for the night.  We arrived around 10pm and were soon snoozing comfortably.

A reasonably early start on Friday had us on our way to Bakersfield – estimated at 12 hours or so away.  The drive was mostly smooth and easy as we traversed the mesas of Arizona and the Mojave desert of California.  Temperatures rose to over 110 degrees in the desert.  Not a good place to run out of gas or have a flat tire.  We passed the time with a long audio book – Liane Moriarty’s “Truly Madly Guilty”.  The narration is excellent and the characters kept us entertained.  It’s a 17 hour book!  We did have a couple of pauses in the book – one for the Space X Dragon launch – an amazing sight.  Isn’t it interesting to look at how the rocket consoles have changed over the years:

The second pause was to wish “Good Lord Alex” a happy birthday in New Orleans.  As we were chatting with Alex, we arrived at a checkpoint on the CA border that I wasn’t anticipating.  The lady asked me, “Where are you coming from?”, and my heart sank at the prospect of being turned around.  Not to worry, she just wanted to know if we had any plants, fruits, or firewood in the car.  With a “Welcome to California” we were on our way again.  Whew!

We arrived in Bakersfield around 9pm and were again ready for a comfortable bed and some sleep.  Early Saturday morning I heard something I would not have anticipated a few months ago.  “I need to find somewhere to go for a run”.  We found a nearby park and I enjoyed my Taco Bell breakfast while Diana ran around the park several times.  After showers we were on the road again.  While Bakersfield could not be described as a pretty tourist destination, it is known for the musical contribution of “The Bakersfield Sound”.  What’s that, you ask?

The Bakersfield sound is a sub-genre of country music developed in the mid-to-late 1950s in and around Bakersfield, California. … Wynn Stewart pioneered the Bakersfield sound, while Buck Owens and the Buckaroos, and Merle Haggard and the Strangers are the two most successful artists of the original Bakersfield era.  We stayed just off Buck Owens Blvd and I played a couple of his songs for Diana on the drive.

We were not sure what type of reception to expect from the Campagna crew on arrival in Pacifica on Saturday afternoon.  Fortunately everyone was delighted to see us and we enjoyed a fun celebration for Alicia’s birthday.  The surprise from all as we pulled up almost made the long drive worth it.

Francesca, the newest Campagna addition, is absolutely gorgeous as her Auntie D continues to remind her.  She had a lot of fun attacking Uncle Marco with a birthday balloon.

Sunday was a somewhat relaxing day – as relaxing as hanging out with a loud Italian family can be expected to be.

I finally finished the Robin Williams biography this week.  The first half was a bit of a slog but the second half really captured my attention.  What a tortured and supremely talented individual.  I forgot how many wonderful movies he made in the early 90s – “Good Morning Vietnam” being the first big breakout from stand-up comedy to blockbuster movies, followed by Awakenings, The Fisher King and many others.  It seems that a lot of people took advantage of his kindness and generosity.  Very sad that he couldn’t ultimately handle his Parkinson’s diagnosis.

I’ll start out the music section with something fun from Buck Owens of Bakersfield fame:

Good Lord Alex turned me on to a new band, the Monophonics, this week.  I like the retro-soul sound quite a bit:

I replied with a favourite song from the Stereophonics.  Get it?  Monophonics to Sterephonics:

And finally something from a new artist, Still Wilson, that I read about this week.  Good trumpet and guitar:

 

 

Week in Review – December 29, 2019

“Quine and Loon”

David arrived in Stewarton on Sunday evening in time for some of my Mum’s yummy steak pie.  Diana found the two of us waiting patiently in anticipation of the pie quite entertaining for some reason.

 

We enjoyed breakfast at the Millhouse on Monday morning, prior to David driving us up to Aberdeen in what’s known as a “Duber” service (David’s Uber).  We gave him a very good rating.  The Millhouse is much nicer than when I visited the previous discotheque incarnation more than 35 years ago.  The 4 hour drive (with a pleasant stop for coffee) concluded just in time for us to ooh and aah over the amazing rural views from Elspeth and David’s home before the early sunset.

That’s the Bennachie mountain range in the distance, and the highest peak, Mither Tap at 1,732 feet, on the left.  How would you like to enjoy that view from your kitchen every day?  A website says it should take about 2.5 hours to climb Mither Tap.  I asked David how long it took him – about an hour – sounds pretty typical of the speed he moves.

David’s younger sister, Suzanne, and her family arrived shortly after us on Friday afternoon.  They came even further than us – all the way from Brisbane, Australia.  It was funny to watch David looking down the road and judging the size and speed of each car to determine if it could possibly be Suzanne.  When they arrived, Suzanne said she knew she was at the right house because she saw the way David was walking through the window.  It was a real treat to meet the entire Ruff family of Suzanne, Alan, Rebecca, Izzy (Isabelle), and Alex.

From the left: Izzy, Alex, Michael, Heather, Struan, Rebecca, Bramble in the foreground

David was a good sport and took the girls out to enjoy the night sky from the hot tub.

The Ruffs headed off to the Lecht Ski Center on Monday morning,  in search of some snow for the girls – not much of that in Australia.  David took us to an excellent coffee shop – the Coffee Apothecary near Pitmedden, a short drive from the house.

The coffee selection and presentation were great, as was the chicken liver pate.  What a nice feature to have such an excellent place close by in such a rural setting.

Alex and Bramble in the back garden

After coffee and a snack, it was Bramble’s time to have some fun.  Who’s Bramble?  Sorry – the latest addition to David and Elspeth’s family, a red Labrador retriever.  David took us to Fyvie castle to give her a good run.  Another pet seemed to sneak in on the adventure – that crazy baby penguin certainly gets around.

 

 

Here’s a video of the exercise routine.  It helps when Bramble keeps an eye on the ball all the way to hitting the ground.  Diana survived a direct hit on the noggin with the tennis ball from the launcher shortly after this video was made.

Tuesday was a quiet and relaxing day.  David, Suzanne, Bramble and I went for a walk around the neighbourhood.  I wasn’t expecting to be doing quite as much “off-roading” through mud and long grass.  Wind power is popular in Scotland, with turbines seen all over the landscape.  We passed under a set used to power the ice cream making operation at Mackie’s farm, next door to Bonnyview.

Our hike lasted about an hour and we had worked up a good appetite by the time we finished.  Meanwhile, the rest of the crew was working their way slowly through a Christmas jigsaw puzzle.  I’ll spoil the excitement and let you know that the puzzle was ultimately completed on Boxing Day afternoon.  I hate to think how many man and woman hours were invested.

We expected an early start on Christmas Day with the young girls in the house.  They were exceptionally patient, and even waited through breakfast before heading to the living room to open presents.  There were lots of fun presents for everyone.  Here’s McD with one of the stuffed trophy heads we received from Elspeth and David.  Aren’t they hilarious?  They did generate some interest on the trip home as they peeked out from Diana’s carry on bag, even getting the once over by the Dallas customs team.

The girls enjoyed the colouring book, pens and charm bracelet kit that Diana picked out for them.

 

Elspeth, David and Heather worked very hard on a delicious Christmas dinner.  From the prawn and smoked salmon starter, through turkey with all possible fixings, through to Christmas cake and pudding (thanks Mum), everything was perfect.

The hilarity level went up a bit after dinner with board game time.  We played several rounds of a game, the name of which I can’t remember now, where you had to describe a thing without using the word.  The teams were evenly matched and so we kept having to play another deciding game.

That was followed up with a game of Cranium.  I enjoy the variety and silliness of this game – everything from clay modeling, to charades, to blindfolded Pictionary.  I was disappointed that nobody could guess my puppeteer work as I had Suzanne demonstrating how to milk a cow.  It’s really lovely to see everyone laughing and having so much fun.

The Ruffs left early on Thursday morning.  Not really that early to give David a good excuse for wearing his pajamas out to close the gate after them.

David and I used our time in the afternoon to coach Michael through enhancing a picture that we had jokingly titled the “Elf on the Shelf”.   I shared this with Brent, who in typical clever fashion, suggested “impaired on the stairs”.

We drove to the nearest decent sized town, Inverurie (Diana can do a decent Scottish accent on this one), for an Indian dinner.  Rajpoot was very good, with everyone really enjoying their meals.  The owner thought he was funny bringing me a kids dessert served in “Miss Pinky” – I had laughed when I saw them on the menu.

Our visit was drawing to a close and we did our best to organize our packing for an early start to the airport on Friday.

The airport is located less than a mile from where I worked my first job out of University at Gearhart.  The area has changed a lot since 1985, but the Four Mile Inn (a regular lunch spot back in the day) is still there and looks much the same.  The Aberdeen airport was small and pain free (other than not having jet bridges, resulting in us having to haul our carry on luggage up slippy metal stairs), and we were soon in some very comfy seats (particularly for a shuttle flight to Heathrow) and enjoying a massage.

The flight to Dallas was around 10 hours and a bit hot and stuffy.  I was glad to get home and stretch out.  I did catch up on some movies and enjoyed a TV series by Billy Connolly about traveling through the east coast of the United States.  I had been reading his autobiography (a present from Mum and Dad) on the earlier flight.

We got a much needed work out in early on Saturday (early to bed and early awake thanks to time changes) and then enjoyed coffee and a crossword in downtown McKinney.  We enjoyed reflecting back on how enjoyable our visit to Stewarton and Bonnyview had been.  We are fortunate to enjoy spending time with our family as much as we do.

We exchanged gifts that were too much to carry to Scotland on Saturday afternoon.  These penguins nest like Russian dolls.  One of several very creative gifts that Diana picked out for me.  She got another puzzle – this one double sided for extra fun.

 

I finished “Olive Again” by Elizabeth Strout this week.  I had recently watched a TV series based on the original “Olive Kitteridge” book, and starring Bill Murray and Frances McDormand.  I kept visualising them as I read this sequel.  It’s a bit of a depressing story as each chapter chronicles residents of the town and their interactions with the aging Olive, but Strout is an excellent writer who can create a very vivid picture of a character in just a few paragraphs.

 

I’m not a huge fan of Christmas music, so try to find twists on it that I enjoy.  As usual, New Orleans to the rescue.  Here’s a big band version of a classic carol.

And here’s a couple from a great New Orleans Christmas album:

I heard this more raucous and irreverent carol by the Pogues on the Scottish radio:

Week in Review – December 1st, 2019

We landed in cold and rainy San Francisco on Tuesday afternoon and were greeted by an American airlines protest outside the terminal – something about “One Job is Enough” – very loud.

Tuesday evening was spent at Adamo’s house enjoying Italian take out.  We were glad to finally diagnose why Phoebe constantly barks whenever Grammie shows up in the house – her hearing aids emit a high frequency noise that drives the poor dog nuts.

 

 

 

Diana enjoyed holding Francesca – 7 weeks now and almost 7 pounds.  I spent some quality time having Massimo read me his favourite books – he has them very well memorized for a 3 year old.  The chameleon doesn’t have a colour of his own is his current favourite.

 

 

 

 

We returned to Adamo’s home on Wednesday morning to do a couple of hours of babysitting while Amy went to an appointment.   McD did a good job on some puzzles and we were able to keep the two terrors entertained almost up until their Mom returned – they’re good for about 90 minutes.

Thanksgiving day started and continued with lots of cooking.  Giancarlo and Diana made a good team preparing two kinds of stuffing and D’s famous artichoke dip.

I particularly enjoyed a story from Diana’s childhood about the reused lunch bags.  While all the other kids in class got a new lunch bag with their name nicely written out each day – poor, tortured D had to reuse whatever size sack was available until it could be used no more.  Apparently particularly embarrassing if containing a smelly leftover fish sandwich.  It was better to go hungry than stink up the whole classroom.  She created this mock up to make her point – Clorinda was too busy to write out full names and just went with initials.  I think I saw some deep seated frustrations being worked out as the bag was aggressively crumpled up.

I headed up to Adamo’s home early on Thanksgiving afternoon to watch the Cowboys play the Bills and wish I hadn’t bothered – one of their weaker performances in a while.  One of the cats was more interested and determined to block my view.

 

Family and friends soon arrived, with Julie bringing up the rear in typical fashion.  Plates were filled with all kinds of delicious offerings and then we took our places at the very long table with the beautiful Pacific Ocean backdrop.

Amy stopped moving for a couple of minutes and allowed a couple of family pictures:

Massimo had on a very cool t-shirt under his flannel – Austin Mix Tape:

Clorinda’s neighbor, Andy, finally got the two terrors to settle down and watch some videos of the new mountain line that has been patrolling Gypsy Hill:

We met up with my boys, Christine, and her Dad, Guy, on Friday evening.  Will chose Vino Santo in Redwood City and it was delicious.  We had fun giving the kids their Christmas gifts as we won’t be in California this holiday season.

Will started us of with his “off-menu” appetizer sampler dish – a very nice way to try a number of things:

The lobster ravioli seemed to be the most popular entree at the table.  I enjoyed  veal marsala – haven’t had that in a long time.

The evening closed with the usual father and sons picture.  It was great to see all the boys looking so well.

We walked up hill to Andy and Jude’s gorgeous home for coffee on Saturday morning.  There was a hummingbird convention underway outside the window – this was just one of three feeders and all were equally populated.

Andy and Jude are a very kind couple, keeping a close eye on Clorinda, and full of good stories.  I enjoyed a new one about hippies sitting outside their record store in the Haight Ashbury region of San Francisco, playing loud bongos and blocking entrance to their store.  They tried several different approaches to moving the hippies on, ultimately having success with an Andy idea – play the Barney song repeatedly through the outside speakers.

I’m pushing publish a day early this week as we’ll be traveling back to Dallas most of tomorrow.

I finished a trio of books this week.  My favourite was “The Dutch House” by Ann Patchett.  I had brought this book to read on my previous trip to Pacifica, but Clorinda ended up getting engrossed in it.  We were able to discuss it this time and she regularly asked me where I was in the story.

I really enjoyed Patchett’s prior book “The Commonwealth” and this was almost as good.

The story is based around the Dutch House, purchased at the end of the Second World War by Cyril Conroy, who combines luck and a single canny investment to build an immense real estate empire, and thrust his family from poverty to great wealth.

Set over the next five decades, the story is about two smart people, Danny and Maeve, who cannot overcome their past.  Despite outward signs of success, the siblings are only truly comfortable when together.  They are ultimately forced to confront the people who left them behind with dramatic consequences.  I recommend this book a lot.

Here’s a paragraph that explains the book jacket picture:

“the thing I couldn’t stop thinking about was the portrait of Maeve hanging there in the drawing room without us.  How had we forgotten her?  Maeve at ten in a red coat, her eyes bright and direct, her black hair loose.  The painting was as good as any of the paintings of the VanHoebeeks, but it was of Maeve, so what would Andrea do with it?  Stash her in the damp basement?  Throw her away? Even as my sister was right in front of me I felt like I had somehow left her behind, back in the house alone where she wouldn’t be safe.”

And here’s something that I don’t understand – “and two hamburgers for Kevin, who could have cared less”.  How did this get turned around in American English?  Patchett is trying to say Kevin didn’t care at all – he couldn’t have cared less – but instead uses, could have cared less, meaning he did care a bit.  It’s interesting how these things that are obviously wrong, become accepted as meaning what they don’t.  Climbing down off the soap box now to tell you about the other books I read.

I didn’t pay a lot of attention to the Amazon book review when one of my favourite authors recommended two new books that he had enjoyed very much – I ordered them up and put them in the to be read stack.  The first, “Very Nice” by Marcy Dermansky is described as:

“A brilliantly funny novel of bad behavior in the post-Obama era, featuring a wealthy Connecticut divorcée, her college-age daughter, and the famous novelist who is seduced by them both.”

Not really my cup of tea, but a quick and entertaining read nonetheless – I think this is what is referred to as a perfect beach read.

The next recommendation, “All this could be yours”, by Jami Attenberg, had a bit more substance.  One back jacket cover review captures the feel well:

“Big Little Lies meets Succession in the scorching heat of the Big Easy . . . Money, power and family are touched upon through Attenberg’s emotional, humorous and sharply written accounts.”

 

“If I know why they are the way they are, then maybe I can learn why I am the way I am,” says Alex Tuchman of her parents. Now that her father is on his deathbed, Alex—a strong-headed lawyer, devoted mother, and loving sister–feels she can finally unearth the secrets of who Victor is and what he did over the course of his life and career. (A power-hungry real estate developer, he is, by all accounts, a bad man.) She travels to New Orleans to be with her family, but mostly to interrogate her tightlipped mother, Barbra.

I enjoyed the characters and New Orleans setting of this novel, but it was also a bit of a quick, beachy read.

I revisited a couple of excellent country folk songs from Hayes Carll this week:

This new Grace Potter song came up on one of my playlists this week and I like it:

Here’s a good one from Austinite Rob Baird.  He’s opened a couple of shows at the Kessler and seems to be gaining a good following:

And finally another Austinite, Shinyribs:

Week in Review – October 6, 2019

“True Companion”

Warning – whiny paragraph ahead.  We closed out September in Austin with 16 days over 100 degrees.  Ridiculous.  Ludicrous even.  Why such an effusive reaction, you ask?  Well, an average September has 3 days over 100.  Why is it necessary to have 5 times as many as normal on the year that I spend most of my time here?  Just to torture a guy that was designed to excel in 50 degree, rainy weather.  Just to finish off my whine, I’ll share that we’ve had 54 days over 100 so far this year – which interestingly is quite a bit below the record.

I’ve enjoyed watching the preparations for the ACL music festival this week on my commutes down Barton Springs.  Oh sorry, some of you haven’t heard of ACL I’m guessing.  Fast forward if you know all about it already.

Austin City Limits (ACL) is a long running and totally excellent Public Television music series filmed live in Austin.  I’ve been enjoying the show for at least 20 years now.  The ACL music festival was born in 2002 and has grown into a mammoth production, staged over two weekends in October.    The event has 8 stages across Zilker Park and this year is October 4-6 and 11-13.  450,000 people attended last year and so you can imagine that central Austin is very busy right now.

I was by myself again on Monday night, but Diana did leave me some of her leftover sea bass.  What to pair with that delight, I wondered.  A tour of the freezer yielded the perfect accompaniment – veggie tater tots.  A delicious bachelor meal.  McD commented that she particularly appreciated the squiggle of mayonnaise.

We successfully concluded a massive, global, highly complex (I know I’m really overdoing it now) project at work on Tuesday.  Seriously, they have been at it for over 3 years, with all kinds of challenges and starts and stops,  and we finished successfully with our last sites in Mexico this week.  Lots of back slapping congratulations, flowery thank you emails, and the like ensued.  That lasted about 10 minutes, and then it was time to get back to work again.  Worn out from all the celebratory high jinx, I enjoyed quiet nights at the apartment on Tuesday and Wednesday, reading and listening to music.  More about the music discovered later, as usual in these posts.

Thursday took me from the “Live Music Capital of the World” (Austin) to “Music City USA” (Nashville) for a long weekend.

Diana made a similar trip from Dallas – greatest musical claim being the birth place of Stevie Ray Vaughan – and we rendezvoused in Nashville around the same time.  A quick Uber to the Westin downtown and we were ready for a quiet dinner and an early night.   The Decker & Dyer restaurant in the hotel fit the bill perfectly.

What do you think of this as a replacement for Penelope?  I’ll be tallying votes and will report out next week.  They do say that orange is the new black.  Take my back condition and size into consideration when casting your ballots please.

Why did we choose Nashville for a few days away?  Well…after the Marc Cohn and Blind Boys of Alabama concert that we saw in California a few months ago, McD said that she hadn’t had enough of just Marc Cohn at the show and wanted to see him again when it was just him playing his regular catalog.  The best location we could find for that was the City Winery in Nashville on Sunday.

A workout was called for after a lazy start to Friday.  Then, as it was a beautiful sunny day outside, I suggested lunch on the rooftop of the Thompson hotel in the Gulch area.  My wife quickly approved that plan.  One of our party should have applied sunscreen prior to the walk over to the Gulch and time in the direct sun on the rooftop.  I’m sure it’s difficult for you to imagine who could have been so silly.

A quick regroup at the hotel, and then it was time to head over to East Nashville to reprise a few of our favourite haunts.  There really are a lot of similarities between Austin and Nashville – a rapidly gentrifying East area of town with great restaurants and bars, a compact and walkable downtown, and a vibrant music scene.

We started with a cocktail on the back patio of the Rosemary speakeasy.  This place has become a bit more commercial since our initial discovery, and not in a great way.  Still a good spot, just not as charming.  It was on the patio, once I had a drink in hand, that Diana informed me that she would like to go to Blake Shelton’s restaurant the next day.  Yee haw!

Unlike Rosemary, our dining destination, the excellent Butcher & Bee, seemed even better than we remembered.  The whipped feta and grilled mushrooms were fabulous.  A huge thanks to Diana for asking the hostess to seat us away from the loud party of girls – they were very high pitched and loud and I wouldn’t have lasted through the meal beside them.  Nashville has become a huge bachelorette party (hen party for my Scottish readers) destination – we saw so many groups riding around town in open topped buses and trailers, even a party fire truck, dancing and having a good time.  At least it keeps them out of the way of folks trying to enjoy the restaurants.  The book that our bill was delivered in sent us on a trip down memory lane – Beatrix Potter.  I read some in my best upper crust English accent.

 

 

We were proud to get a workout in again on Saturday morning, before setting off for the madness of Broadway.  This is a street similar to 6th street in Austin – one honky tonk with live music after another for 3 or 4 blocks.  It was particularly packed at lunchtime on Saturday.

We satisfied D’s request and had a pleasant lunch at Ole Red, Blake Shelton’s place.  The downstairs was communal seating and we sat with nice folks from North Carolina, who ordered the largest plate of nachos I’ve seen.  Our fried pickles and quesadilla were equally massive.  Lance and Lea provided a pleasant mix of musical accompaniment.  I texted Alicia:  “You’re Mom is torturing me!”.  The rapid reply: “Welcome to the club.  We’ve been waiting for you!”.  Phunny girl.

My navigational skills failed me again after lunch.  I was trying to follow the walking directions on my phone to get to the Ryman auditorium.  Diana was quite convinced we were headed in the completely wrong direction – even more annoying because I was headed uphill.  Of course she was correct, and we got some unnecessary exercise in after the large lunch.

We did a self-guided tour and really enjoyed exploring the Ryman.  The movie that starts the tour was exceptionally well done and did a great job of covering the history.  Originally opened in 1892 as the Union Gospel Tabernacle, its construction was spearheaded by Thomas Ryman (1843–1904), a Nashville businessman who owned several saloons and a fleet of riverboats.  Ryman conceived the idea of the auditorium as a tabernacle for the influential revivalist Samuel Porter Jones.

Lula Naff leased the building in the early 1900s and promoted all kinds of shows and events.  Some of the names to perform in the early years include Marian Anderson in 1932, Bill Monroe (from KY) and the Bluegrass Boys in ’45, Hank Williams in ’49, The Carter Sisters with Mother Maybelle Carter in 1950, Elvis in ’54, Johnny Cash in ’56, trumpeter Louis Armstrong in ’57,  Patsy Cline in ’60, and Minnie Pearl in ’64.  The Ryman also served as the regular Sunday venue for the Grand Ole’ Opry and Johnny Cash TV shows.

After falling into disrepair, and a renovation spear-headed by musicians, who loved the acoustics (said to be better than Carnegie Hall) and atmosphere of the venue, the Ryman hosts performances by big name musicians most nights of the week.  Here’s a picture of some of the folks that have played there:

The tour finishes with a photo opportunity.  Here are the next big stars to be discovered at the Ryman.  Poor Diana is just trying to avoid being bonked on the head with my guitar.

I’m not sure you’d be very comfortable in the ancient pews while listening to us perform:

After another short rest at the hotel, it was time for a real highlight of the trip.  I had read about a restaurant named Bastion that sounded right up my alley:  only 24 seats large, advertising an “adventure menu”, and spinning vinyl records.  On arrival through a sliding metal door, you are welcomed into the little bar for a pre-dinner drink.  Jeremiah took very good care of us.  Then we were seated at the kitchen counter and presented with our “adventure menus” to make selections.  Only a couple of ingredients are revealed to aid in the decision making process.

K’s choices

D’s choices

The courses were excellent with lovely presentations and descriptions.

First course – manchego and country ham waffle cones for K, oysters and tequila for D
2nd course – hamachi and hibiscus for D and raw beef and green curry for K
desserts – they treated us to all three

All of this deliciousness was set off beautifully by the “Fly Blind” wine pairings – some really unusual selections.  And of course there was the treat of vinyl albums for background music – some early Elvis Costello for the 2nd course.

A very impressive fire was burning outside the restaurant with coals transferred inside regularly for the inside grills.

Bastion is so good that I would recommend people make a trip to Nashville just for the experience of dining here.

Sunday made three workouts in a row – a rare feat with our work schedules.  Then we reprised another old favourite – brunch at Husk.  The shrimp and grits were different and tasty, but still not up to the gold standard – Ricks in downtown McKinney.  The rain stopped long enough for us to walk back to the hotel, passing the City Winery on the way.  They were having their 5th anniversary harvest festival outside, with really good bands playing  – including Ivan Neville and Dumpstaphunk.  We chose not to spoil our musical appetite for the big evening show.

The Cowboys played the Green Bay Packers at 3:25pm and I found a sports bar just off Broadway to watch the game.  The Corner Pub had a massive screen showing all the games and we found a good spot in time for kickoff.  What a horrible first half – nothing working for the Cowboys and everything clicking for the Packers.  Ugh!  The Boys pulled it together in the second half with some good play, but it was all too little and too late.  What a disappointment.

Can you guess what wasn’t a disappointment on Sunday?  That’s right – Marc Cohn.  Mark Erelli opened the show – a very talented singer songwriter, who had recently played at the Ryman.  The sound in the City Winery is really fabulous.  I appreciated his song “By Degrees”, which I believe is about the need for improved gun control.  Erelli showed up later to play guitar on several Marc Cohn songs – and did an excellent job on slide guitar.

I have another of Erelli’s songs that I’ve been enjoying in the new music section at the bottom of this post.

Marc Cohn played all of our favourites and sounded as good as ever.  Diana commented that she could hear the Blind Boys in her head on “Work to Do”:

Then came my favourite, “Listening to Levon”, a tribute to the late great Levon Helm of the Band:

The song that put Cohn on the musical map, “Walking in Memphis”, with the classic “Ma’am I am tonight” line:

“Silver Thunderbird” always tugs at the heart strings:

And now it was time for the closer, also the opener to our wedding reception and my marriage proposal, “True Companion”.

We were fortunate enough to have Marc Cohn sign a new poster he was selling, featuring the lyrics to the last verse of True Companion.  Diana took the time to tell Cohn about the first time we heard him play the song, and his very kind gift of flowers to a military wife in the Kessler audience, whose husband couldn’t make it to the show – not a dry eye in the house.

Diana was very happy with the show and the experience – and isn’t that what life’s all about – sharing happy times with your True Companion.

She wasn’t so happy the next morning with her 4am start to get back to Dallas for a client meeting.  I had a more leisurely start, time for breakfast, and even the best shoe shine I think I’ve had, before flying back to Austin.

Such a fun trip – I’m glad you were able to join me Diana.

 

 

As promised, here’s “The Hitter” by Mark Erelli.  Did you already forget about him?  Remember, he opened for Marc Cohn.

There’s a new album, “Ode to Joy”, by Wilco out this week.  I’ve only listened to it once through.  I was surprised in the first few songs that there was none of Nels Cline’s angular guitar playing.  It did finally show up, but this is certainly mellower than their recent output.

I watched an interview of Billy Gibbons from ZZ Top this week, and he was talking about this Lightnin’ Hopkins song.  I’m sure you can here a number of ZZ Top songs in this.

And finally, a new discovery for me, ZZ Top’s superbowl halftime performance from the late 90s: