November 2018 – Keith Robertson

Week in Review – November 25, 2018

Monday and Tuesday were quiet, work from home days. It was nice to be back in the routine of working from home with Diana, if only for a couple of days. Travel to San Francisco on Wednesday was pretty quiet and painless and we arrived in time to meet up with Will and Christine for dinner at Sushi Plus in Redwood City (where Will’s new apartment is located). Will was able to give us a ride in the new BMW M240, but not the full experience since it had rained most of the day. It was entertaining to have the live run down of all the special features that he had customized on his factory order.

Will took care of most of the ordering at Sushi Plus. The “fire roll” and “super duper roll” were very good and unique. Clorinda enjoyed her left overs of “super duper roll” very much.

Christine has just started a new job and was clearly very pleased and excited about it. Will told us a fun story of how Christine started working in the technology field – she was running the jewelry department at Nordstrom and one of her customers liked her service so much that she told her son (owner of a technology startup) that he needed to hire the lady who helped her from Nordstrom to interact with his customers.

Adamo and Amy hosted Thanksgiving at their home. We had a group of 13 and so it was good that they had just bought a big new table. As usual, Amy, Adamo, Diana, and Clorinda created a delicious feast. My favorite was the “French Onion Soup stuffed mushrooms”.

The little monsters above (my nephews, Luciano and Massimo) did their best to disrupt my quiet afternoon of football viewing before the meal. The Cowboys pulled out a nice win over the division rival Redskins and I was able to watch some of it. I like this picture of Clorinda making a key point with her neighbor Andy as he’s cooking up something for the feast.

On Friday we were lucky to have an early dinner with all three boys at Vino Santo in Redwood City – Will’s favourite Italian restaurant. The food and service were both excellent. We started with an off-the-menu appetizer sampler that Will apparently orders on each visit, then shared lobster ravioli and some delicious scallops. By this time we were starting to get full and hadn’t ordered main courses yet. Diana had a calamari steak and I had a beet salad. Will, on the other hand, had plenty of room for a full size ribeye steak. Clorinda enjoyed left over calamari later in the evening. Dinner was really good and we had a very nice conversation with the boys. Here’s a picture with Finn from the evening and one of all three from Thanksgiving day.

Saturday was an early start to the airport to fly home. The airport was much busier than on Wednesday with lots of families flying. We had a concert at the Kessler on Saturday night and so drove from the airport to a downtown hotel and then headed to the Bishop Arts district in Oak Cliff for a pre-concert ramble. This is a picture of the Mobil pegasus outside the hotel (the pegasus atop the Mobil Oil building was a stalwart of the Dallas skyline for many years).

I enjoyed the movie “Pick of the Litter” on the flight. This follows a litter of five puppies born at the Guide Dogs for the Blind facility as they progress through training and assignment to owners. Only two of the five were placed as guide dogs with one retained as a breeder, one assigned as a PTSD support dog, and one finishing as a pet. The training to have the dogs learn to ignore owners’ commands when they would put them at risk was fascinating – to be able to teach a dog to decide that traffic is unsafe and to not proceed across a street even though given the command is amazing. I highly recommend this film.

Our Oak Cliff evening began at Macellaio – a new restaurant by the couple behind the fabulous Lucia Italian restaurant. We enjoyed an amazing chicken liver mousse and delicious cocktails. After that Diana’s new boots were given a good comfort test as we walked 1.1 miles to Nova for dinner. They passed with flying colours.

We met Diana’s co-worker, Janelle, and her husband at the Kessler to see the Band of Heathens. I think this is a band we’ve seen more than any other – the first time was when we took a trip to Austin several years ago. The opening act was “Matt the Electrician”, also from Austin. He originally worked as an electrician all day, rewiring houses and playing concerts in the evening. We loved his voice, songs and between song banter.

The Band of Heathens put on an excellent show – the first half was a selection of their popular songs and the second a full performance of their latest album, “A Message from the People Revisited”. This was a Ray Charles album from the 1970s that speaks to many of the social issues that are still relevant today. We had a table in the front row and it was funny to watch McD “swooning” over the two lead singers.

Here’s a video of “Abraham, Martin and John”, my favourite from that album.

And here’s the encore performance of “Hurricane”:

Another in a long list of great concert experiences at the wonderful Kessler theater! Here’s the full set list, courtesy of the swooner:

On Sunday morning, we took advantage of being downtown to visit Smoke for breakfast. I enjoyed my usual pulled pork benedict and Diana ordered a bacon burger so that we’d have leftovers for dinner. Breakfast reminded me of some pictures Finn sent this week of his latest breakfast creations.

We (ok, mostly Diana) put up a small Christmas tree on Sunday afternoon. Much smaller than usual since we’ll be gone over the holiday and couldn’t face hauling the regular tree down from the attic. I always get a kick out of how much Diana enjoys unwrapping and placing the ornaments on the tree. That’s the famous angel that Adamo and Amy repaired last year on top.

Two great new albums were released this week by Roseanne Cash and Mark Knopfler (I read this week that he was born in Glasgow). Here are tracks from each and a closer from Matt the Electrician.

Week in Review – November 18, 2018

The experimental Vonlane bus service to Austin early Monday worked out well. I enjoyed avoiding security and all the other airport hassles. It was nice to be able to spread out and relax for the 3 hour trip. I’ve booked my next few trips on the bus. Thanks to Diana for getting up so early to drive me to the bus.

The Uber driver who shuttled me from the bus drop-off point to work provided several useful tips – suggested a great local radio station, told me about a music club that sounded appealing, and an unannounced show at that venue by a group named “Sis DeVille”, comprised of Carolyn Wonderland, Shelley King, Floramay Holiday and several others – these are several of our favourite performers that we’ve seen at the Kessler and Poor David’s Pub and I bought a ticket later in the week.

Hill Country Sunrise from the Sonesta Breakfast Area

The hotel this week was the Sonesta Bee Caves which is located about a 20 minute drive from the office and next to the Hill Country Galleria outdoor mall. It took some time to get back and forward to the office but the view from the 6th floor restaurant was very good. It’s a Tapas Bar at night and has an amazing wrap around deck – nice when the weather is warmer than it was this week. I enjoyed the sunrise views in the morning with an early breakfast. This hotel also featured music art in the rooms:

Our friend Gonzalo was scheduled to interview at my office on Wednesday and came in on Tuesday night to be ready for the morning. We enjoyed an excellent dinner at the Second Kitchen and Bar – the truffle grits with G’s short ribs were amazing. I started with smoked salmon rillettes (way better than I anticipated) and then had a delicious beet salad with big chunks of brie – right up my alley.

After dinner we tried a new place that I had read about – The Townsend. This is a speakeasy style bar up front and a small music venue in back. One of the owners is an acoustic engineer and this showed up big time in the quality of the sound systems in the bar and the concert space – amazing sound! The concert in back by Charlie Hunter was sold out and so we enjoyed the music in the bar and then snuck into the music venue for the last few songs.

Charlie Hunter is a pretty unique performer – he plays an eight string guitar with 2 bass strings and 6 lead guitar strings. He maintains the bass guitar rhythm and plays lead guitar at the same time. Hunter’s music is mostly classified as jazz but has a lot of rock, blues and other genres mixed together. This performance was with a trio of singer, guitar/bass, and percussion. Here’s a short video followed by a recent review of the show that describes it much better than I could.

“Lucy Woodward almost stole the show. And she might well have done so, wholly and completely, if her two bandmates had not demonstrated the same touch for nuance she did throughout the two sets. In turns insouciant and sultry, saucy and winsome, the woman was the aural/visual picture of well-practiced discipline wherein the notes she belted out on a Nina Simone song were as finely-phrased as those she breathed so softy on one from Teresa Brewer circa 1959, “Music! Music! Music! (Put Another Nickel In)”.

If the guitarist/frontman had not so obviously relished her participation, he might not have so keenly complemented Woodward’s performance by savoring the moments his fingers ran up and down his own instrument. But plucking those ringing harmonics, bending some bittersweet notes and dropping the low-register bombs were subtleties similar to the singer’s, but also to those that appeared in the percussion work of Keita Ogawa”

I highly recommend The Townsend if you’re ever in Austin and looking for a great bar and small music venue. There was a book about Austin music in the bar that had articles on both Alejandro Escovedo (lives in an apartment above the check in desk at the Belmont hotel) and Marcia Ball (see post last week about her amazing concert at the Kessler).

On Wednesday I took Gonzalo to lunch at the nearby TacoDeli which has a very nice woodsy location near a Zilker Park trail-head. I tried the chile relleno taco special and loved it. It was nice to catch up with G on Tuesday night and Wednesday – we spent a lot of time working on tough issues together at my previous job and I’m hoping that we’ll get an opportunity to work together again.

In the afternoon we had a town hall at work for all the Information Technology employees where I was introduced. I enjoyed the view of my boss with a long horn cow in the background from where I was sitting.

Thursday was the Thanksgiving Potluck at the office – I had meetings all the way through the lunch hour and wasn’t able to participate but it looked like folks were having a great time.

I had dinner at the Hill Country Galleria mall – empanadas and salad at the Buenos Aires Grill Argentinian restaurant and then a drink at a Texas themed place that had a good guitarist/singer and the football game showing.

Friday was back on the bus to Dallas. I was interested to see a Basset hound joining our group and claiming to be a “service dog” to be allowed on the bus. HGTV was annoyingly playing on the TVs on the bus – this is the home buying/improvement channel that I had to block at the house because McD was playing it incessantly. Thankfully it hasn’t been on in a long time now.

Diana picked me up from the bus and took me to a lovely dinner at the Neighborhood Services restaurant on Lovers Lane. I loved my haddock and Diana her lobster dish.

This place has such good food and such a relaxed ambiance – we need to go more often.

After dinner D had arranged a recognition event for her team at the hockey game at American Airlines arena. I was starting to get tired and grumpy by this point. It was funny to see the Mary Kay cosmetics company suite next to D’s company suite.

The weekend was pretty quiet with workouts, coffees and crosswords- nice to settle back into our normal routine for a few days.

I finally finished a new book this week – “Half Blood Blues” by Esi Edugyan. This was a very enjoyable book about jazz musicians, the second world war, and race relations. Here’s the Amazon review:

“Berlin, 1939. The Hot Time Swingers, a popular jazz band, has been forbidden to play by the Nazis. Their young trumpet-player Hieronymus Falk, declared a musical genius by none other than Louis Armstrong, is arrested in a Paris café. He is never heard from again. He was twenty years old, a German citizen. And he was black.

Berlin, 1952. Falk is a jazz legend. Hot Time Swingers band members Sid Griffiths and Chip Jones, both African Americans from Baltimore, have appeared in a documentary about Falk. When they are invited to attend the film’s premier, Sid’s role in Falk’s fate will be questioned and the two old musicians set off on a surprising and strange journey.

From the smoky bars of pre-war Berlin to the salons of Paris, Sid leads the reader through a fascinating, little-known world as he describes the friendships, love affairs and treacheries that led to Falk’s incarceration in Sachsenhausen. Esi Edugyan’s Half-Blood Blues is a story about music and race, love and loyalty, and the sacrifices we ask of ourselves, and demand of others, in the name of art.”

It was nice to spend some time reading again this week after the busyness of the new job.

Here’s some more music from Charlie Hunter – he has many interesting albums to sample. And a great track I stumbled upon from Jimmy Smith on the Hammond organ.

Week in Review – November 11, 2018

Can you believe my baby turned 30 this week? He does seem to be doing quite well and I’m proud of the man he’s become and all that he’s accomplished in his first 30 years. Will has always been a car nut – BMWs in particular – solidified when he visited the factory in Germany during his internship. He treated himself to an early birthday present which you can see here. I think it looks pretty fierce and here is Will’s update on the engine:

“It has a B58 inline 6 cylinder twin scroll turbo. Twin scroll is the epic new balancing technology! Supposed to be the smoothest engine that BMW has ever made. And 400 hp and 400 torque approximately.”

This week was a heavy one of work and travel for both of us. Diana dropped me at the Dallas airport very early on Monday and I had plenty of time to make my flight, which arrived early even though it was foggy in Austin. I enjoyed a breakfast taco at the airport (as promised last week) and then headed to the office. That’s another one of the cards that McD spoils me with on the table – found it as I was getting something out of my briefcase. The Cowboys pretended to play football on Monday night and I watched the game at the hotel until I got disgusted and fell asleep before the game was over. Diana traveled out to St Petersburg, Florida again Tuesday through Thursday for a big client presentation that went well.

Tuesday was my music day this week. I tried out a Mediterranean food truck on South 1st Street with a combo gyro and falafel (two of my favourites). I’m going to enjoy trying out and rating all the various food trucks that are generously spread around Austin. After dinner, I drove around the corner to the Saxon Pub, where Dave Grissom plays a free early show at 6pm most Tuesdays. I didn’t get there until 7pm and so all seats were taken and the place was packed. I stayed for a couple of songs (both excellent) and then left. I wasn’t able to identify the folks who rode their horses to the show – maybe it was the performers? I will be back in a future week to catch a full show. Dave Grissom is an excellent guitar player who started in Joe Ely’s band, played in John Mellencamp’s band, and has gone on to become a much in demand session musician (particularly in Nashville). I suspect that his show covers multiple styles and varieties of music – I’ll let you know when I get there on time in the future.

From the Saxon, I dropped the car at the hotel and wandered over to Antone’s in downtown Austin to see about their free Blues show. In contrast to the Saxon, this was a very quietly attended show. I settled in for 20 minutes or so but wasn’t drawn in by the music – too much old school blues and harmonica. And so it was off to find the next musical opportunity.

Hoping the third venue would be the charm, I walked around the corner to the Elephant Room on Congress Avenue. This is a basement jazz club that turned out to be very pleasant and a highlight of the evening for me. The sound was excellent with plenty of comfortable seating. Sarah Sharp and band were performing – I forgot to note the guitar player’s name but he was outstanding. I enjoyed Sarah’s voice and here are some quick snippets of the performance:

From the Elephant Room, it was a quick walk across the Congress “bat” bridge back to the hotel and a brief check on the election results.

Sarah was a founding member of another band named the Jitterbug Vampires which performs at the Elephant Room on Wednesday nights. She is no longer in the band and I didn’t enjoy the singer as much, but the guitar (same guy from Tuesday) and saxophone players were both very good. I listened to a few songs, and then went upstairs to a restaurant named Swift’s Attic for dinner.

The menu at Swift’s is described as “New American Tapas”. The food and cocktails were both excellent and I look forward to walking back to this place again soon. My cocktail was a “Newgroni” – the normal negroni recipe with rhubarb bitters added – and it’s available on tap. I’m going to have to add some of these bitters to my barrel aging negroni because they really enhance the flavour very nicely. The scallops were fresh, perfectly cooked and paired with delicious sauces and carrots.

On Thursday night I tried something completely new to me, an author night at a bookstore. Joseph Fink, author of “Alice Isn’t Dead”, was interviewed at Book People on Lamar Street in West Austin. I had been planning a trip to Waterloo records and Book People after work and when I visited the website found this event. Both stores are great examples of independent and wonderfully curated places that rarely exist anymore. Book People reminds me of Wild Detectives in Oak Cliff but at a much larger scale and without the cocktails and wine (they do have coffee) – the staff are very knowledgeable and have many blurbs and recommendations throughout the shop.

I wasn’t at all familiar with Fink’s work – apparently he is pretty well known by virtue of a podcast series that he does that parallels his books. I enjoyed the interview that Deb Olin Unferth hosted – she has published several novels and teaches writing at the University of Texas. Her questions were insightful and often quite funny. One of my favourite stories from Fink centered on his parents – his Mum and Dad met in the dining hall on their first night of college freshman year and had been together ever since. Both were teachers and they didn’t have a large circle of friends and so their lives became very intertwined. His Dad died 7 years ago and he talked about how much his Mum has changed as she became a singular person rather than part of a couple. It didn’t hurt that he mentioned Jason Isbell’s “If We Were Vampires” song in the story – one of my favourite songs of the last few years.

After the interview, Fink read a passage from the book and took questions. An interesting and different evening activity – apparently Book People hosts more than 300 of these a year – so lots more opportunities for me to listen to authors talk about their work.

I was able to go standby on an earlier flight on Friday and got home before 4 pm. We had a quiet night when Diana got home from her hair appointment and fell asleep early.

Saturday started with workouts and then a late lunch at Zaytinya (this is a Turkish word meaning “olive oil”) at the Star in Frisco. It’s a mezze restaurant specializing in small plates like a Greek tapas place. We had tried Zaytinya once before and enjoyed the small plates and cocktails very much. This visit was equally positive – I had an ultimate G&T (Hendrick’s gin, Fever Tree Indian tonic water, lemon, lime, juniper berries) that took the bar tender some work to assemble, Baba Ghannouge (great presentation with pomegranate seeds), and a falafel wrap. Diana tried the lamb chops – delicious once the bartender supervised them being cooked properly and not overdone.

After lunch we went boot shopping at Nordstroms. I drove around for a while before finding a parking spot and was amazed at how busy the mall was – I thought malls were going out of business. Diana found several pairs of boots that she thinks will see her through the winter. I’m not sure I was very helpful with my selections.

On Sunday we made the drive down to Oak Cliff for brunch at Boulevardier. You might remember me raving about a brunch we had there about a month ago. I opted for the smoky mushroom toast and Diana had the omelette. The first mushroom toast was delicious with a perfectly cooked poached egg. The second toast featured a hard boiled egg trying to masquerade as a poached egg – very disappointing for a restaurant of such repute. Even worse was the attitude when I brought it to the attention of the staff. They did pay for our entire meal – I would have much preferred they just apologized appropriately and brought me another toast.

We made it from Boulevardier over to the Twilite Lounge in Deep Ellum just in time to see the end of the New Orleans Saints game – they beat up on the Cincinnati Bengals 51-14. The Twilite is an “official Saints watching destination” and has a jukebox with lots of great New Orleans music. One of Tim’s favourites, Bonerama, was playing today – it’s a band with 4 trombones that cover rock ‘n roll songs and Tim really doesn’t enjoy them.

Now we’re home with a fire going and getting ready for the Cowboys vs. Eagles match up that starts at 7:20 pm.

This Bob Seger song popped up on a Spotify channel this week. Neither McD nor I had heard it before but we both like it a lot:

Here’s one I heard on “Discover Weekly” from Spotify by Peter Green – the best blues guitarist I’ve heard:

And finally, a beautifully nuanced version of “Can’t Find my Way Home”, the classic Blind Faith song. This is by Nathan East who was the bass guitar player in Eric Clapton’s band for years, with Clapton as a guest:

Here’s an interesting song from the band Air – I enjoy their music and haven’t listened to it in several years. They are a duo from Versailles, France with a somewhat electronic sound. This album, “Moon Safari”, was their debut. I imagine this is what Booker T Jones would sound like if he was born in Paris in the 1990s.

Week in Review – Nov 4, 2018

This was a big work week for both of us – I started my new job and Diana had her big project in downtown Dallas to spin off a new company go live on Thursday – what we’ve been calling “D Day”. The project went much better than anyone had expected with the CEOs of both companies saying nice words to the team. Diana did a great job of keeping everyone organized and motivated to make this happen so smoothly.

Monday got off to a bit of a slow start for me – had to wait on a replacement plane coming from a hanger and then circled Austin a bit because of fog at the airport. I was happy to see some good breakfast taco options at the airport – I’ll take advantage of those next week.

I made it to the office by 11 am and started the whole on-boarding process – filling out forms, new laptop, phone, meeting oodles of people and trying to remember their names. The office is very modern and comfortable and everybody was very pleasant and welcoming.

Our hotel was just across the river from downtown Austin and I was happy to see turntable and guitar art above the bed. You can see how high the river is from all the recent torrential rain. My boss and I walked to downtown and had a delicious Italian meal at Red Ash – my welcome aboard dinner.

Tuesday was a long day at the office, learning a lot about the business and what needs to be done with Information Technology. We had a quick dinner at the hotel bar and called it a day.

Diana had snuck a card for every day of my first week into my suitcase – my parents just told me how spoiled I am – I know. The Halloween card made me laugh out loud – Pumpkin Penguin.

Each of the groups of hotel employees had created a pumpkin for a competition. Here are my two favourites:

On Halloween night I was able to catch my first concert. Doyle Bramhall II was playing at Antone’s. Doyle has been a favourite for many years – I saw him with the Arc Angels in San Antonio more than 20 years ago and have seen him a few times in Eric Clapton’s band. He is an amazing guitar player and songwriter. I visited Antone’s from San Antonio in their previous location but hadn’t been to the downtown, 5th street location.

Dinner before the concert was at Elizabeth St, a French Vietnamese restaurant that I had noticed while visiting the Seventh Flag coffee shop.

I’ve been very pleased with the number of independent coffee shops in Austin – a nice change from the plethora of Starbucks in the Dallas area. You can see the airstream trailer in the background of the Seventh Flag picture – this is one of many food truck areas throughout the city – another nice feature that I’ll have to start exploring.

Back to Elizabeth St – amazing poached shrimp spring rolls and sauce selection followed by a delicious Banh Mi with chicken liver mousse, pork pate and roasted pork. The house made baguette was very good as well.

And now back to the concert. CC Adcock opened the show with his excellent band from Lafayette. Antone’s was running a costume contest and the majority of the crowd were dressed up. I had seen CC Adcock once before in New Orleans and remembered him as a talented guitar player and songwriter. He put on a great show for over an hour and really got the crowd warmed up. Here’s one of his songs:

Doyle Bramhall delivered an amazing set for close to 2 hours. A highlight for me was when he brought Lukas Nelson (Willie’s son and a big part of “The Star is Born” movie) out to play on a couple of songs. They did an excellent cover of Dylan’s “Going, going, gone”. Here’s the guitar solo form that and then a verse:

It was a little after 1 am when I made it back to the hotel – tired but very happy with the Austin music scene and with Antone’s music club.

Thursday was a reasonable day at the office. I was able to get out at a decent time, look at an apartment (very small) and then go for a walk along the river trail and find the Stevie Ray Vaughan statue.

On Friday morning I tried another one of the local coffee shops – this one is close to my hotel and open 24 hours a day -very good coffee and food and lots of seating. I made it back to Dallas around 4pm and met Diana close to her office downtown for a drink and a snack before we headed over to Oak Cliff for dinner and a concert.

Dinner was at Nova (our new favourite pre-concert dinner spot) and then Marcia Ball at the Kessler.

We’ve seen Marcia a number of times in Dallas and New Orleans and she never disappoints with her one of a kind honky-tonk, barrelhouse piano and a mix of upbeat and melancholy songs. Shelley King opened the show, reminding us of the memorable Poor David’s show we saw where Shelley, Marcia and Carolyn Wonderland all performed together. Here’s a funny song from Shelley:

Marcia had been inducted into the Austin City Limits Hall of Fame on Thursday night. Austin City Limits is the long running PBS music show that is revered by its audience and musicians alike. I obviously need to get on some mailing lists so that I don’t miss important Austin events like this going forward.

She delivered an excellent set. My favourite was her outstanding cover of Randy Newman’s “Louisiana 1927” – such a foreshadowing of Katrina.

As usual, the band was excellent. Here’s a song that showcases Mike Schermer, the guitar player in Marcia’s band for many years.

And finally, here’s a song about Mardi Gras that I enjoyed that includes Shelley King:

I made it home to my own bed for the first time in the week around midnight.

We saw the movie “Bohemian Rhapsody” on Saturday afternoon. This was very well done, starting and finishing with the famous Live Aid performance by Queen. I remember watching it at the home of my Gearhart boss, the Sunday before my first day of work following University. My take away from the movie was how happy Freddie Mercury was when performing, and how tortured he was when trying to deal with everyday life – very sad story.

The movie ends with a reenactment of the full 20 minute Live Aid set, and I thought a better ending would have included the final song that Freddie and Brain May perform later in the event – “Is This the World we Created”. What an amazing thing Bob Geldoff did in 1985.

Our typical Sunday started with a workout, then coffee and a crossword – theme “Maniacs” – key clues: “Pork Lo Mein”, “Spanish Main”, “Flowing Mane”, and some city in the state of “Maine” that I don’t remember now. Get it? Different spellings of “Main” comprise “Maniacs”. Right now, I’m watching the New Orleans Saints destroy the Los Angeles Rams (the only undefeated team left at 8-0). 35-17 at the half. I’m officially picking the Saints for the Super Bowl this year.

We probably don’t need any more music this week, but here’s a song that Antone’s was playing before the show. They play a great mix of early 60s soul/R&B music. This is by Eddie Kendricks and I love the sound:

And since I haven’t had a chance to do any real reading this week, we’ll replace the book update with a song from Mighty Mike Schermer (Marcia Ball’s guitarist):