A send off for a drummer...

How do you say goodbye to a drummer?
Bill Carroll, his wife and kids are heading off to build churches in France. They will soon be leaving us. So how do you say goodby to a drummer?
You put together a team of 6 other drummers to play on his last Sunday as worship leader (for now). I knew I was in trouble when at 6:30 am I saw this...

So much drum gear was flying all over the place that they even needed a piece to hold doors open.
So here's the make up of the drum ensemble...
Four yes count em, four kits.


A couple of percussionists.


A few guitarists, singers, a bass player, a great sound guy and you have a rhythm heavy music morning that kicked some serious music butt.




Here's to you Mr. Carroll, we'll miss you

The garden trend...

For several years now Steve Bailey has been studying different ways of being more self sustainable. Kim has also been making the transfer to growing our own produce. We have been enjoying eggs laid by our hen for a while now. Along comes an economic downward spiral for the country and sure enough more people are following suit. One of the employees of our local nursery was mentioning how more and more people are starting "Victory Gardens". We are looking forward to onions, squash, snap peas, cucumbers, zucchini, peppers, strawberries, garlic, shallots, chives, cantaloupe and a host of herbs. Kim even pulled up a rose bed to make room for tomatoes. Between what Steve B grows and what we can produce, we are hoping for a nice co-op of crops to share.
As a matter of fact Kim is upstairs making a strawberry/rhubarb pie to share with Steve and Barb (which is only fair, it's his rhubarb).
Through the magic of social networking I have stumbled across gardens from Steve Mochel in NY to Troy McMahon in Kansas City. I think I like where this is all going.

Part of Steve Bailey's garden


Steve's Rhubarb


The Mochel/Shuler/Bradley garden


The McMahon garden


Part of Kim's handywork


Our egg maker


Wow...
Here's part of the Greever gardens in IL.
peppers, eggplant, beets, kohlrabi, carrots, radishes, cabbage, cauliflower, strawberries, broccoli, spinach and several types of lettuce.

A few girl pics...

I just can't put it into words how bad I feel if I don't see these guys every few days or so. These are from Saturday.

New kid on the rail...

Well, I finished my second shift at the Pub.
I have to say it seems to be a young persons game. My trainer is younger than Laura...woo hoo!
She is patient with me. The refrigerators under the bar hold about 150 different bottles from all over the world. I do my best to find the brew and about 60% of the time I have to cry uncle and ask where it is. I haven't caught her rolling her eyes at me yet but if I don't get up to speed on the location deal, she might kill me. Case in point. I had to find a something or other "negra" in Spanish is dark or black. I am scouring the Mexican section and simply can't find it...."uhhh, Mary?" "Dude, that a Spanish beer" Now the Spanish beers are over by Ireland. But of course they are!
I better figure it out soon. There about 40 beers on tap, if I can't find them, I better look for even more different work. Now the tenders get order tickets that we fill and put the drinks by the server window. When we tenders serve people sitting at the bar we take the fill the order then enter it into the computer. The ticket then prints up over by the glasses. Now we have already filled that order so we just grab the ticket and pitch it. My first and second training nights. I filled drink orders that had already been filled because I didn't look to see the name on the ticket. Last night I only made that mistake twice. Tonight I was doing so good but then Mary walked up to a lonely pint of beer sitting at the window and yet again duded me..."uhh...dude? you filled your own drink order that you already filled.
uhhh....well? I was practicing?...crap.
Until the next shift...

My boss Steve

Heading home...

Red Prairie 09 is a wrap.
A good show to be a part of. I am very thankful indeed for the work.







Some of the best production guys in the biz...

Status...

It's Saturday afternoon and I'm sitting in a Starbucks because the lousy Marriott has no free internet anywhere. They used to have lobby internet for free but no more. I can stay in a crappy hotel most anywhere and get free internet. Hey cool! another rant!

I am in San Antonio doing a 4 day show for an RF id tag company called Red Prairie. I hope to get more production work from the guys I'm working for. They use me for about 3 weeks a year. I sure could use some more. I mentioned in a previous post that I wound up going to bar tending school. I sent Steve Palmer form Palmer Place an email asking for some restaurant referrals and he wrote me back saying that he was desperate for a tender for the Summer. I finished my training last night and jumped on a plane this morning for this show. I find out what kind of hours I will be getting when I get home.
I find it interesting that being around all that booze, I have absolutely no desire to drink at all. I was thinking it might be the opposite. I had to take a course called BASSETT covering all the liquor laws and responsibility of bar tenders in IL. It really opened my eyes to making sure we don't over serve people.
I hope the tips are ok, I'm afraid I might be working my tail off for not much scratch. That kind of defeats the purpose of getting the job...lol.

More later...

Happy Mothers Day to all who read.

D

A job well done...

Looks like I owe Mealz a trip to Toys-R-Us.

She used the potty chair!

Amelia turns three!

I can hardly believe that three years has passed since the birth of my little buddy.
Jim is starting her off early with Baseball. A Grand Slam, a Cubs win, some Dad time and some cake made for a pretty dang good day.



Cubs fans are a little too loud!




A well deserved nap on the way home.


Maybe should have taken her to a Sox game?


Maybe should have taken her to ANY game!








At lease someone got some good Mommy time!