Today at 10a.m. EST, I got behind the wheel of the Cadillac, in Bradenton
Florida.

I got out from under the wheel at 3:30a.m. CST, in Columbia, Mo.

I'll write some more Friday.

Tired now.

Awesome.

Good shows, great people.

I will lay out the whole story after we make the long drive home.

Tonight we are playing the Ale and the Witch with our buddy Funky D>
We call him Animal, other folks call him Funky D.

Please to come out, if you got the time and inclination.

Special shout out to Doc in Nashville again, always a good man.

I'll get back at you soon...

Sometime on Friday, before eating at Jacques(alligator
 an andouille cheesecake) and watching
the legend that is Phil Melancon entertain, we found out
the Circle Bar would not be open.

We got an email from the fellow who booked the shows and he
apologized and told us to be at the Saturn Bar on St. Claude by 9
to play on Sunday.

The Saturn is another of those New Orleans institutions that
has been featured in literature and lore, but you can't tell if
it's seen better, or worse days.

That's certainly not an insult, everyone was very cool with us and
the local bands The TinTypes and Blind Texas Marlin forked over
their hard earned money to help keep us on the road.

They also put us on in the middle, between the two local outfits.
That's the right thing to do, if you can.

The bartender/part owner Bridget(?) was extremely nice
to us as well, handin over free beers and dispensing knowledge.

Our boy Twista, offered to play craps with us and also, to box
Blind Texas Marlin and relieve them from their entertainment
duties. He seemed to have some grudge against those
guys. Maybe it was the two trombones.

I thought we played pretty well and we had quite a good time.
The neighborhood can be a bit exciting, but ourselves and the
Cadillac survived.

Also, Phil showed up to see us play, on a Sunday night, what an
awesome guy. Honored.

We went to try out the newish establishment run by
the former proprietors of Parasols Thursday afternoon, Traceys.
Delicious, as expected.

Then, we headed on over to the Neutral Ground to play the 10 o'clock
slot. I was pretty dead by the time we got done, not having done
much sleeping.

The Neutral Ground is as cool as ever.

We sold a few c.d.'s and headed out for some very much needed
sleep.

Interesting night.

We got stuck into headlining by a couple of local bands with not
much concern.

If you have a job to be at early on Thursday morning and you
give a shit, don't book a show on Wednesday night. Also,
don't tell everybody that's the case and then stick around
until closing to collect "your" money.

I should write a damn rule book.

We made the best of it, got to see some friends from long ago
some friends from medium ago and some new friends.

We then crawled in the car and headed for New Orleans.
I got to argue with Brock part of the way and other people
part of the way(on the phone).

It's fun staying up all night yelling at people.

I drove all but about 2 hours from the time we left
Columbia.

We pulled into New Orleans at about noon, had Fred lead us to drop
the car off and headed back to the apartment.

We headed out of Black Mountain about noon and got off the mountain
when a weird light came on in the car dash.
It took me a few minutes to realize it was the tire warning, about then
the car started handling funny. I guess it was a good thing that
it didn't happen coming down the mountain.

The rental car road-side service about drove Brock insane and we might
have been in much worse shape, had the tire change fellow not
known the right things to do. We ended up paying to have the tire fixed
ourselves and heading down the road, after about a 3 hour run around.

I'll tell the full story sometime, but the big question I have is... Why can't
two grown men put a doughnut tire on a rental car? Are we too mentally
deficient to be allowed to put a spare on a Corolla?
Also, how can a road side service company have and not implement 4
different plans in a 60 minute period?

We rolled into the Pittsboro area and went to check in at the performers
gate. Shakori Hills is a huge and well run event. We were checked in
and had our passes in about 25 minutes. I don't know what their attendance
numbers are for the weekend, but it has to be over 20,000.

We played Thursday night at 11 and got a really appreciative reaction.
It's really fun to see people walking by, stop, stare and come over and
listen for the rest of the set. I think we made some fans, as a lot of them
came back the next afternoon to see us.

After we finished up, we rolled back to Rodger's campsite.
Brock joined the general jamming. I watched and drank many Yuengling's
until it was time to pass out in the tent.

I got up the next morning and wandered about until it was time for the 1p.m.
two step lessons in the dance tent. I discovered I still don't need any two step
lessons. Then it was time, time for the big event.

At 2p.m. Friday afternoon my number 1 Honky-Tonk Hero, J.P. Harris took the stage and it was amazing. People were two stepping, there was a tripping balls hippy kid doing some kind of crazy shimmy, who hit a back flip in the
middle of J.P.'s version of "Bright Lights and Country Music". Probably the
first back flip ever performed during a Bill Anderson song. Brock danced with
an obviously nervous and confused girl in a fedora. It was perfect.

We headed back to the camp afterwards, got our stuff and went to play our
set.

We played, had a good time, ran into J.P. who reminded us not to let him
do fire tricks after 10p.m.(cost him some beard) and loaded up and headed for Kansas.

We had a great time at this festival and once again we have to name check
Rodger Lenhardt, who got us there. We'll be back in the spring, if we're allowed and we'll be spending the full four days.

I'll have the theme done for the Elderberry Cordial by then.

We drove in from Louisville and arrived around 6 in the morning
thinking to wait until check-in and get a room to loll about in.

Let me tell you something about Asheville. Until November, rooms are
really expensive.

We drove around for a long time, until we thought we were going to have
to join Occupy Asheville, just to get out of the car.
Luckily, a kind lady directed us to the Acorn Motel in Black Mountain.

Black Mountain is an awesome, awesome little town. It is scenic and friendly
and we got to watch someone in a van, with Florida plates(of course), drive
straight through the front doors of the local Keller Williams office.

In a strange coincedence, I had not long ago finished reading a post-emp speculative novel about the town. Odd, but it made me feel like I knew
where to go and who to talk to.

We had a really great time at the Fairview Tavern, a private club on the east side of Asheville. We sold a lot of cd's and met and talked to some really
interesting local folks, who were doing very interesting things with
their lives.

Among them was our buddy Skylar, who moved back there to work his families
award-winning organic farm.

It was just a really good and laid back time and a good thing.

We headed for Louisville and points South on a lovely fall day.

The drive isn't bad, but the time zone confusion still gets me.

Not much to say about the show.
As an old coach used to say, "You win some
you lose some, some are rained out."
Although the people that wanted us to play songs for them
to karaoke at were hilarious.

We packed up about 2:30 and headed for Asheville.

This is where the story gets tiring.