It's Decoration Day...

The Road: Where to start...been a pretty busy couple of weeks. We did the Good Morning Atlanta show, and that went off without a hitch, long day. The show at the Variety Playhouse that night was awesome. Britt and Charlie are two friends of ours from the band Blackberry Smoke, they stopped by and hung out, Charlie got up and played some guitar with us. I went to the Vortex for lunch that day, great burgers. I decided to go ahead and go for it, ordered the "Elvis Burger". This thing has the patty, I think 4 pieces of bacon and fried plantains smothered in a good helping of peanut butter. All this with a side of sweet potato fries, and I ate every bite. Go me! It put me down for a couple of hours, and I didn't feel right the rest of the day. My buddy ate the "Quadruple Bypass" or something, he didn't feel too good either. All the shows with Reckless Kelly were great, Workplay in Birmingham is a great venue, Kyle Gass, known as KG of Tenacious D, or not known at all to some of you, was playing next door. His guitar player got up and jammed with us on a song. Rabb's Steakhouse in Ruston, LA was great, weather was bad for most of the day, but they always feed us well, and show us a good time. Good people at Rabb's if you ever want a great steak, and friendly people. Than it was on to Tyler, TX. Wasn't really looking forward to Tyler, but it ended up being ok. I got to have dinner with some long time friends that I haven't seen in quite a while, and it was great catching up. I was also pleasantly surprised to find a bookstore right next to the venue which was cool. Picked up a couple of LPs and a book, and was on my way. We left Tyler and went to Helotes, TX to John T. Floore's Country Store. This is a great place to go see a show if you ever get the chance. It's a venue with a ton of history. Willie Nelson used to play a weekly gig there a long time ago. I stopped in New Braunfels along the way so I could see my father in law and get to spend some time with him. Show went great. I don't think we had everything packed up until about 1:30am, headed home for a few days off.

Readings: Didn't do a whole lot of reading on this trip, did pick up The Dalai Lama "A Policy of Kindness" and read it. I had never read anything written by him before, so that was interesting. I guess I just don't understand the whole idea of always being happy. It sounds nice, but for me it just doesn't seem realistic, or a goal I find useful. I love some of the ways he handles the question of other religions versus his. It is in no way condescending, and I'm sure there are plenty of lessons to be learned from someone like him. I'm still reading War and Peace, and trying to keep "A People's History of the United States" by Howard Zinn going as well. I watched a great documentary on Howard Zinn the other night titled "You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train." It was a great overall portrait of the things Zinn achieved in his lifetime, from being in the middle of the Civil Rights movement as a professor at Spellman University in Atlanta, to his achievements in the peace movement, along with numerous books and plays that he wrote.

Randoms: Watched Michael Moore's documentary entitled "Capitalism: A Love Story." It was pretty good. I'm not a huge fan of the way he makes movies, but he does bring up interesting points, most of which would already be obvious to someone paying attention. I think he is useful in getting certain things out into the greater publics radar, even if he does it in kind of a goofy way. He does call capitalism evil, I don't understand why that is such a shock to people. Maybe too many times democracy and capitalism are lumped together. You can have democracy without capitalism. The whole point of capitalism is the choice to do whatever it is you want to do, and make as much money as possible doing it...kind of. Nowhere in the definition of capitalism is there room "for the greater good." It makes no concession for those that work really hard, but never make it. Somewhere along the line that person made the wrong decision, and that is their problem, nobody else's. Of course everyone's definition of "making it" is different, and some are happy with what they have, even if that doesn't seem like much to everyone else. Consequently, it is those people that have little that are usually the most willing to give. They know how it is to have little or nothing, and how it is to go bankrupt because you get sick. No matter how much you tell me it will cost, I just don't get it. We spend so much money on weapons to kill and destroy but God help us if we want to spend more money on healthcare that some illegal immigrants are going to abuse. That's the part of capitalism I will never understand. Profit over the welfare of other human beings. I like Todd Snider's take on it from his song "Ballad of the Kingsmen"..." You know, every ten years or so our country and some other little country,

We start firing all of our newest weapons
At each other for some reason or another, right or wrong,
Like it or not, it happens, and when it happens
People get shot and when people get shot,
They show it on tv a lot every night at six o clock
And you don't even have to be eighteen to see it, you don't even have to be in first grade,
First grade where they teach the kid pride
They tell him he'll need to thrive,
In a world where only the strong will survive,
So he's taught the art of more
To compare to and to keep score, Monday thru Friday while
He stares at the floor til' Sunday they make him go to
School once more, only this time they make him wear a suit and a tie
And listen to some guy who claims to know where people go
When they die, tell him that only the meek are gonna inherit the earth... Well shit,
By this time the kid doesn't know what anything
Is worth, now brothers and sisters I am only one guy
And I don't even know the words to that song Louie,
Louie but I can tell you right now without batting an eye
That the next time some latchkey kid goes wrong
It aint gonna be 'cause Eminem gets to say the word Fag in his song
And I'm not trying to preach to ya either,
I'm just trying to sing to ya too, you know string a few words together..."

Thank's Todd! Now I'm going to have dinner with the wife and go see the Drive By Truckers at Gruene Hall. I'm having trouble figuring out how to post pics, so I'll have to get the advice of Robin, and than I'll have some for ya from this last run. (The title of this entry is a Trucker's reference)