More Sunshine State Days

Hi friends... It has been some time since I last updated the blog. Busy times. Fun times. Here's what's been happening:

The weekend after my Saturday gig at Mother's Musical Bakery in Sarasota, followed by the Sunday Bilmar festival in Saint Petersburg, I played another show on Sunday, November 29, in a place where I love to play: Sweetwater Farm, in Tampa. Sweetwater is a big organic farming collective. On Sundays Sweetwater hosts a big market day featuring live music. On November 29 I was the feature act, with my faithful musical cohorts Rick Kennedy (bass fiddle) and Carl Wade (guitar) supporting. Triad (Doug Purcell, Rick, Carl, and Barbara Shafer) opened for me.

I have to admit I wasn't feeling very well as I did my Sweetwater show this time. My allergies had been in full cry for several days before, and I was just about exhausted by trying to breathe! I found myself having to make a choice between not being able to inhale and being turned into a zombie by an antihistamine was taking...so I chose zombie-fication. Terrible. I will not make the mistake of taking Aleve again. Somehow I got through the show...and to my surprise, afterward, many people told me they thought my set was very well done---that I did an excellent show. I guess that is the result of my having many, many years of experience onstage. Whatever. I'm glad it went well. Wish I could have been there. :=))

Here's Sweetwater.

After the Sweetwater show a crowd of us repaired to the home of Greg (Gonzo) Gove, not far from Sweetwater. Gonzo and his lady, Susan Aungst, hosted a great gathering with good conversation in Gonzo's pleasant Florida room overlooking a waterway, outrageously good chili along with other tasty treats prepared by Susan, and a healthy dose of music making. Gonzo is a first-rate guitar fingerpicker, banjo picker, singer and songwriter I've met fairly recently when he was in the audience at a show I did. I knew on jamming with him for just a short time that I wanted to do more of that, and we did it last Sunday as Gonzo's place. Almost all of those who gathered at Gonzo's place last Sunday were good musicians. When I got to Gonzo's the allergies seemed to leave me for a while, and I was able to have fun.

A few days after this good Sunday, my longtime friends and supporters (and fine musicians who recently performed on a national television show) Larry and Karen Doran arrived from far Nebraska for a visit. They travelled to the southeast to spend Thanksgiving with family living in Apopka, in central Florida, and then to visit with me and to make a trip with me to Key West, Florida.

(I spent Thanksgiving with music friends in Wesley Chapel, Florida, north of Tampa, where we ate and visited and made plenty of music. Had the pleasure of playing once again for the first time in long time with old music buddy Doug Travers (guitar, Wesley Chapel), and then, in a lengthy session, with excellent swing guitarist Ellie Schwartz, of Wesley Chapel, and Bob Dauhm, harmonica and flute, of Leesburg.)

After Larry and Karen Doran and I visited the famous Clearwater Beach, the sponge docks at Tarpon Springs, and a few other points of interest (and ate at the excellent China Buffet in Largo), we had lots of fun travelling to and visiting Key West. None of us had been there before. Florida is a BIG state very long, and a drive from where I live to Key West would be a looong one. Instead of driving all that way, we drove first to Sarasota, where we visited my old friend and Florida folk music grande dame Jean Hewitt. At Jean's place we met an Irish music tour promoter, Tom Pigott, who arranges tours for American performers in Ireland. Needless to say, I found this very interesting and have already started discussing with Tom doing such a tour myself.

Leaving Sarasota, we drove on to Fort Myers Beach, where the big Key West Express high-speed catamaran docks, spent the night in a motel dockside, and then in the morning were off across the Gulf of Mexico to the southernmost point in the United States: Key West. That catamaran really tore up the water. We covered the distance from Fort Myers Beach to Key West in three hours flat! Amazing!! To our surprise the boat travelled far enough out to sea that no land was visible as we progressed. Choppy water made the passage pretty rough, but when we arrived in Key West the weather was great, beautifully sunny and bright. We took the "conch train" tour around the picturesque old town, ate big at an excellent buffet restaurant where Larry and Karen had their first experience of eating loquats, a Florida fruit that looks something like an apricot but is much tastier, and then we wandered around the streets and in general had a fun time. After about six hours in Key West we boarded the catamaran for another high-speed---and yes, pretty choppy--transit, back to Fort Myers Beach.

I enjoyed riding on the upper decks, outside, some of the time, both going to Key West and returning. Seeing dolphins at play during the day on the way south and the Gulf lit by a full moon at night on the way back north were two highlights for me.

Here's Key West Express.