1 Week

In the past week I:

• Went to the CMT Awards show for the sole purpose of seeing John Mayer and Keith Urban perform. Thankfully I scored free tickets and didn't have to pay, because it would have been a waste of money. BUT, I am really looking forward to the JM/KU show at the Gorge in August.
• Sat in a line for almost 5 hours to see Conan O'Brien perform for about an hour at Jack White's Third Man Records. They only let about 320 people in. I was 302 and my roomie was 301.
• I went to Bonnaroo for FREE. And had bleacher access to two stages so I had a nice place to sit. I am old (er) and like my comfort and thus I didn't camp. BUT, it was still fun to go on Saturday and Sunday. I saw Norah Jones, the Avett Brothers, Stevie Wonder, Jay Z, Regina Spektor, Phoenix, and Dave Matthews Band.
• Tonight I was front row for Patty Griffin at the Ryman. According to my friend who is a huge Patty Griffin fan, the show was good, but he wished she would have played some of her older stuff. I still enjoyed it.

And tomorrow? Esther comes! And Thursday we get to see some sites around Nashville. And then on Friday we go to see the Dave Matthews Band and see a bunch of friends.

You might need to pinch, because I can hardly believe the week I have had.

Antwerpian Adventures

***I started this the weekend of the flood. Things got busy and I am just now getting back to finishing up the post. I figure I better attempt to wrap up my Europe trip before Esther comes to visit me next week!***

Talk to me for any length of time and you will know that a favorite topic of mine is food and beverage, especially when it involves travel or my home city of Nashville.

And that leads me to my travels in Belgium. I have been to Bruges (twice now), Brussels, and on my most recent trip, Antwerp. I know there are major sites like churches and museums (that I can’t really remember), but Belgium isn’t really too famous for those, at least in my book. They are famous for diamonds and lace, and at my age, neither of which I care to buy. The NATO Headquarters is in Brussels. Audrey Hepburn is Belgian. And how could we forget the Muscles From Brussels- Jean -Claude Van Damme? Also, a Belgian.

But, my favorite thing about Belgium has to be the food. So, Esther and I spent pretty much the entire day in Antwerp walking around and eating. IT WAS GLORIOUS! Waffles with chocolate and whipped cream. Belgian chocolates bought from two different chocolate shops. French Fries. Beer. Pretty much my favorite way to see a city- walking around and eating.

So around 5 in the evening, Esther and I decided we needed to head to the venue. We knew what time the doors opened and we got to the venue about 30 minutes before that time. We weren’t too concerned about where we would be standing for this show because our plan was to wait for the Amsterdam show to get to the venue since it would be her hometown show. When we get to the venue, there was a small crowd, but nothing too large. There were about 6 sets of double doors. In my limited concert going experience in Europe, if it is a GA show they open all of the doors at the same time, or at least within seconds of each other. So when I saw everyone crammed to the right leaving the last two sets of door with no one in front of them, I decided that was going to be my place for the next 20 or so minutes. Esther ran into some people she knew and I stood there waiting. So a few minutes before doors I can see the venue staff getting ready to open the doors. The crowd is still mostly to the right and there are a few more people by me now. The venue staff start to come to the doors and they decide to open one door.

MY DOOR.

AND ONLY MY DOOR.

That’s right folks, they opened one door to start with and they chose mine. I am guessing because I looked the most sane and least likely to trample someone if they opened it. So, when I realize what is happening I can’t believe it. I am in the venue and take off for the arena. Flashbacks of Lucca, Italy were flying through my head where we had been some of the first ones in and only to get in and they had let 200 people in before the general public. So when I walked in and saw NO ONE in the venue I could not have been happier. I walked, who am I kidding, I ran to front row center where Esther and I would stand for the rest of the night.

What felt like minutes later, Esther finally runs into the venue and joins me up front. We can not believe our luck. I go buy posters for the both of us while she holds down are spot. We chat with the people around us. There were the Dutch guys beside us and a crazy American who carried a pillowcase “sign” for Carter that he brought to all the shows he went to. He proceeded to show me his drum stick collection picture on his blackberry. I have a very good suspicion that this guy is single and at the age of 40 something might still live at home with his mom. I hope he will be able to survive when DMB takes the year off from touring.

So Alberta Cross, the opening band is now one of my favorites. I actually made an effort to listen to their music before the show, so I was prepared. During DMB Esther and I just had so much fun singing along and grooving to the music. Both of our favorite songs were played, hers is #41, mine is Two Step. I am pretty sure Stefan and Carter even smiled at us too. Basically it was a pretty awesome way to go to a show that we would have been perfectly fine standing in the back for.

During the encore song All Along the Watchtower, Dave was back lit. That back light happened to shine right on Esther and I. Carter looked directly at me smiled. I smiled back and pointed at him. He pointed at his drum stick and I shook my head yes. He smiled some more. At the end of the show he came right to me and handed me a drum stick. I pointed at Esther and he handed her one too! It was pretty awesome if I do say so myself.

You Can Call Him Jesse

You can call him Jesse.

You can call him Jesco.

You can call him Elvis.

My life was forever changed the day I saw the documentary The Dancing Outlaw. My family had just moved to Charleston, West Virginia from Southern California. I'll be honest here. I didn't really know that much about West Virginia. I was stuck in a West Coast bubble. I was 12 and innocent to pretty much anything not bordering the Pacific Ocean. So it should come to no surprise that when I was younger I also thought such things like everyone was Catholic and the only college football teams were in Pac Ten (So what if I still think this is true?). So when we moved to West Virginia I was in for a little bit of a culture shock. I wasn't really sure where we were going, but I knew it would be a little different. To prepare for the move my dad printed off some pages from our encyclopedia that at the time was stored on fancy CD-rom. To the best of my memory the print out mentioned nothing of hillbillies or race relations or maybe I just didn't understand such things at the time?

Once I got there I knew this was not the place for me. I didn't want to start school (I took the entire first month of 8th grade off) and I spent that first month doing a lot of shopping and hanging out with my mom and her best friend, Jane. Jane was a friend my parents knew from the 70's and who also happened to be a native West Virginian. During that month we watched Tommy Boy (Jane's favorite) and she shared with us her passed down VHS of the Dancing Outlaw documentary. I had never seen anything like it before. I was in awe that Jane had even hired Jesco to "play" at her neighborhood block party. Literally, she pulled out a $20 and he rocked for her party. This documentary was pretty well known and shared among friends. If you haven't seen it you are missing out.

So, a week or so ago I found out Jesco White would be "performing" at a local venue. Immediately I contacted my friends and everyone was in. Some had been at the show where he opened up for the Black Keys and some had literally just seen the Dancing Outlaw documentary at my place. Everyone was in. I also mentioned it to a few other friends and it appears there is a lot of interest in the Dancing Outlaw. So much interest that we are holding another viewing party for the documentary before the show.

In case you couldn't tell, I can not wait for this!

I leave you with this. Possibly one of the most red neck things ever to grace this blog. A picture of a picture. But not just any picture. A picture of Jesco White to Jane from Jesco that Jane taped to a another picture in her house.

Warrior Dash 2010

We came. We saw. We conquered. I can now call myself a warrior.



You know how I spent my weekend? A night of camping with the East Nasties in the Georgia mountains and 2.5 mile race with obstacles, including lots of mud and definitely lots of laughs. SO MUCH fun.

My wish is that everyone can have such a supportive and fun group of friends.