We headed back out to the Shakori Hills GrassRoots Festival again this spring.
It was good to see everybody, as usual. It was extremely wet by the second day, but a very good time again.

We played on Fri. right after the huge rain storm began, the power even went out once, somehow it gave the whole thing a more communal feel. stomping and shouting and splashing around.

That was cool for the first few hours, then it just got annoying and wet.

We also played the Kraken Bar, which we had never done before. It was a pretty cool time. They allow dogs and we like dogs. I will say their muzzles were all supiciously wet, alcoholic dogs, maybe?

We headed down to Florida, to hit the same old suspects, plus a couple of new spots. Always good to see the folks at the Ale and the Witch and the Belle Isle Yacht Pub and Will's Pub, of course.

We did Bryan Childs 9 Bullets radio show in Tampa, which he claims will soon be called the Sad Bastard Song Club. Then we drank a lot of craft beers with said Bryan Childs at a place called Southern Brewing Company, I believe. Really good beer and neither one of us likes craft beer.

This caused us to be late for our show at the 8th Avenue Pub in Safety Harbor, but I think we still pulled it off o.k., despite having to play the whole night, which means, covers(not my favorite thing) and more work. Luckily our buddy Animal jammed along with us and we made it through.

Thanks to everybody who helped on this run and everybody who didn't can piss off.  Another one's coming soon.

Oh Halloween.

We played with our buddies the Funky Seeds. Good fella's all.
Particularly exciting to see Animal (who wore a fine Animal hat).

We did a couple of sets, one featuring "Cowboy Batman".
I wore no costume, unless you count going as my Dad.

As always, the Ale and the Witch is a very cool place and Brett(sp?)
the owner, is another in the fine and very welcoming bar owners
we've encountered across the country. Maybe it's not playing punk
rock clubs, as much, or just a change in the atmosphere, but man
there are a lot of nice people running venues these days.

We headed out after the music was over and hung out and played
music at Inside the Gates,  until about 6 o'clock in the morning.
Oh what a night.

We rested most of the day then headed up to St. Pete .

The Ale and the Witch is a small place that uses the interior courtyard
of a several story building, with bars and restaurants, as their venue.

Brett, the owner is a good guy, who seems to like us a lot. That means we
like him a lot too.

The lady who we were "special guests" of Jun Bustamante, played some banjo
songs and then a young man played a few songs, then we went on. We played pretty well, I thought.

The show was over by 11, so Animal packed us over to the Ringside Cafe (seems to be a pattern developing) and we ended up onstage with Dennis Stadelman from Cope playing bluegrass songs. I'd say he's a pretty good
banjo player.

The Stanley brothers were well represented in that set.

After that we called it a night.

Also, congratulations to Animal and the future Mrs. Animal.