Okay, Memphis is well behind us and I am off to the the next big thing. Of course I first have to get home.
The show was under attended, which was expected, but the general quality of the attendees was what we call "well qualitified", which is to say there were few tourists, and. Only two people started the conversation with "well I've built a couple of guitars and I have a few questions for you". As you know, I don't mind this kind of question, but at some shows it seems to be 2/3 of the folks who walk up to me and I get to wondering why I had to pay to be there. Not so Memphis, nearly everyone was a potential customer or a peer.
We stayed till Monday and then drove up to Springfield, Missouri. Arkansas and Missouri were absolutely beautiful, and Linda and I agree we would like to make a special trip to spend more time in the Ozarks. I found Springfield to be a lot like my home town of Petluma, but several times the size. Great all American town feeling.
In Kansas City we had what I hope will be our final BBQ at a place called Joes. It was great, but enough is enough. Linda thought she recognized the people at the next table as being a family who hiked the Bandolier Ruins at the same time as we did, and she was right! Amazing coincidence as we had driven over 2000 miles since through the south and they had done similarly through the north. We exchanged numbers and hope to see them in our neighborhood as they claim to make regular visits to Napa Wine Country.
Then we drove up to Hiawatha Kansas where my mother was farm raised. I had been there at 13 and was amazed at how much nicer the area is tan in my memory, which was surely colored by mom's rejection of the place. Lovely place and lovely people. Then we headed down to Topeka, where Linda had lived for a time as a preteen. We tried to find supper at about eight last night but the entire downtown was already closed!
This morning we will head toward Denver on 70, but as it is some 550 miles off, we expect to pull up a bit short who knows where.
My next big thing, by the way, will be the four day Grass Valley Bluegrass Festival put on by the California Bluegrass Association on Fathers Day's four day weekend. I know I will see at least two of you I saw in Memphis at this venue. I will be home for one and a half days during which I will unload, do the laundry, and put string basses and fiddles into the trailer for another kind of show altogether a mere 150 miles from home.
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