Weekly Updates – Page 27 – Keith Robertson

Week in Review – September 23, 2018

Diana stayed in Florida for work on Monday while I flew back up to New York in time to attend a show at the City Winery.

The Loft is the smaller venue upstairs at the winery, which is located in the SoHo neighborhood. I heard that the whole location is closing at the end of the year as Disney has purchased the entire block to consolidate their New York locations. The entertainment was provided by the Ana Popovic band and I had limited expectations, not having seen or heard much about her.

Popovic is a blues singer and guitar player who grew up in Serbia and now records and resides in the United States. I was very pleasantly surprised by Ana’s music and particularly by her excellent band, which included trombone, saxophone, and keyboard players from New Orleans. It’s always interesting to notice someone who speaks with a very noticeable Eastern European accent, singing without any trace of an accent. Here’s one of my favourite performances of the evening, “A New Coat of Paint”, a cover of the Tom Waits song from the classic “The Heart of Saturday Night” album.

Another song that I enjoyed was “Slow Dance” from her most recent album, produced by the fantastic Keb Mo:

Finally, here’s a jam between Ana and the brass section:

This was a very enjoyable evening of high quality music performed in a very nice, intimate venue. I’m sorry the club is closing, but understand they are looking for a new location to open in the New Year.

A typical New York scene greeted me on returning to my hotel – dueling jackhammers digging up the street right outside several hotels at 11pm.

I flew back to Dallas on Wednesday evening and always enjoy the view of the New York skyline from La Guardia airport.

Around the same time, Will and Christine were arriving in Stewarton, Scotland to visit my Mum and Dad for a couple of days.

Here’s what Will had to say on text about this visit: “Had such an incredible day today with Granny and Grandpa! Woke up to a homemade breakfast of haggis and black pudding. Then went to the coast to see Ailsa Craig. Walked the coast, got haddock fish and chips and smoked salmon at the famous ice cream shop. Found a little shop with authentic curling stones and these stones made from compressed heather that were really cool! Went into some old churches. Then headed home. Had homemade cottage (Cumberland) pie for dinner and meringue for dessert then ended the night with some Arran single malt scotch. Also had some really good Dunlop cheddar and oatcakes with dessert!!” The way to Will’s heart is clearly through his stomach.

The next day they all met up with Struan in Glasgow, where Will treated himself to a Hunting Robertson kilt and accessories. I enjoyed my Mum and Dad telling me today that Will reported having “done” Scotland, England, and Spain in the couple of days he spent in each.

The Dallas area was treated to around six inches of rain overnight on Saturday, which resulted in some pretty bad flooding. We thought the rain was mostly finished in the afternoon and I took Diana to see a movie without letting her know the name or what it was about. The trailer led me to believe this was a light, romantic comedy which was just what McD needed after a very long work week. See what you think:

It turns out the movie, “Life Itself”, had a significant amount of tragedy embedded in a very well done story of three generations of two families. The creator of the TV show, “This is Us”, had a major role in the film and you could certainly see the similarities in story telling techniques. We’re looking forward to “This is Us” starting a new season this week as it’s our favourite TV show these days (sorry Brent). I enjoyed the references to Bob Dylan’s “Time Out of Mind” throughout the movie and how it played into the story. Here’s a song from that excellent album:

It was still raining heavily when we exited the movie and Penelope was so suitably miffed with this that she shut down one of her window wipers.

I saw this video on TV this morning and thought it was hilarious – a Great Dane mimicking his owner doing lunges.

https://www.msn.com/en-ie/news/video/great-dane-performs-lunges-with-owner/vp-AAApfAX

I’ve been enjoying this new song by Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits fame. Kind of a new jazzy feel with the saxophone solo.

Week in Review – September 16, 2018

Back to New York again this week. The hotel that I usually stay at was transformed into “The Macallan Manor” for several nights as the club members there enjoyed a very fancy scotch tasting experience with some good bands playing.

It’s always very sobering to be in New York on September 11th, as we all remember watching the horror unfold on our television sets in 2001 , while the New Yorkers lived through it. My colleague took these pictures at the memorial – the only night of the year when lights outline the silhouette of the fallen twin towers.

Meanwhile, I was attending a Jethro Tull concert at the Beacon Theater on the upper west side. This was a sold out, 50th anniversary concert by a band that I enjoy very much but have never seen live. My pre-concert meal was at an excellent Mediterranean restaurant, the Hummus place, that is right behind the Beacon theater.

The mushroom hummus was amazing and the falafels were some of the best I’ve had. On exiting the restaurant, I was amused to see the Jethro Tull equipment truck – “Scotsman & Clan Transportaion”.

The concert was very enjoyable with a lot of video accompaniment from the 50 year history of the band and of world events.

It’s fairly amazing that a band with a flute as it’s main lead instrument and with a very classical bent has survived this long. Here’s a video of their Bach cover, “Bouree”.

The concert lasted well over two hours, with an intermission. The Beacon is such a gorgeous old theater with great acoustics – here are a couple of pictures from inside.

Predictably, the last song of the show was “Aqualung” which came with an entertaining video backing.

Hurricane Florence caused me to change my plans and travel down to rendezvous with McD in Florida a day early on Thursday. My flight to St. Petersburg arrived with no issues and a smooth ride overall. Diana’s hotel was within walking distance to downtown and we enjoyed exploring the area. Dinner was at the Copper Shaker which had excellent cocktails, service, and food.

Diana worked most of the day on Friday and so I was able to explore the breakfast joints, bookstores, coffee shops, and cigar bars of St. Petersburg reasonably thoroughly. I found it to be a very friendly, eclectic, walkable, and enjoyable city overall.

On Friday night we moved over to the Sandy Pearl resort in Clearwater Beach. The beaches there are made up of beautifully fine white sand. We enjoyed dinner at the very casual Frenchy’s Café, known for the grouper sandwich and “Crabby fries, and then enjoyed a lovely sunset.

Saturday started with lobster benedicts at Clear Sky café next to the hotel – very good. It was very hot and humid by the pool and so I didn’t last very long before retreating to air conditioning. I heard some great music coming from Clear Sky in the afternoon and so wandered over to listen. Diana joined me, and we met a fun couple from the nearby town of Dunedin. It made me smile because a work colleague recently moved back to Dunedin in New Zealand to run his family businesses. The couple had known each other from Kindergarten until the end of middle school and had recently reconnected – some good stories. They also recommended “Bon Appetit” in Dunedin for dinner.

We enjoyed dinner and the Dunedin sunset very much. Our waiter, Michael, had been in the restaurant business for 52 years, and certainly knew what he was doing. We shared a steak tartare starter, and then Diana enjoyed a nicely cooked lobster tail while I had the Dover sole (deboned table side by Michael). This was very much an old school restaurant.

In an effort to coax me out of air conditioning and down to the pool, Diana treated me to a poolside cabana on Sunday. This was a very special and luxurious way to relax and enjoy football and a book all day. I’m writing his post from the luxury of the cabana couch. Thanks Diana!

The Cowboys don’t play until later today, but the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (the local Florida team) just beat the Eagles, which always helps the Cowboys playoff chances.

I’ve been absolutely loving the book “Rules of Civility” by Amor Towles this week. This is about the exploits of a young lady in New York during the years surrounding the Great Depression and is exceptionally well written. I loved “A Gentleman in Moscow” which was Towles most recent novel and this, his debut novel, is even better in my opinion.

On the music front, I was reacquainted with this amazing Ray Charles song – a tribute to Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, and John and Bobby Kennedy.

Wow! What a song and what a performance.

Week in Review – September 9, 2018

Diana spent the week in Pacifica with her Mum while I worked from home all week and did my best to be self sufficient. The great news is that Clorinda is home from the hospital and back to normal after giving us quite a scare. Her neighbors, Andy and Jude, had a party on Saturday night to celebrate their sixtieth birthdays and you can see from these pictures that Clorinda was her old-self – camera always at the ready. She’s very fortunate to have such kind neighbors.

Diana captured this lovely panoramic sunset from the deck of Andy and Jude’s home.

I passed the time on a rainy Saturday by going to see the movie “Blaze” at the Alamo draft house and cinema in Denton. The movie is directed by Ethan Hawke and tells the story of the country folk musician Blaze Foley, a little known and very talented songwriter. The movie is very well done in a documentary style but with actors playing the roles of Blaze and his compadre Townes Van Zandt. Charlie Sexton, who we saw at the Kessler a few months ago, plays an excellent Van Zandt. Here’s Foley’s best known song:

Today has been spent weeding the garden and enjoying the start of the football season. The Cowboys haven’t played yet and I’m hoping for a positive start. I’m looking forward to McD finally returning home this evening.

A trend began this week of people substituting penguins for Trump in pictures with some hilarious results. Thanks to Brent for turning us on to these. Definitely a positive change.

I read a few short stories from Ry Cooder’s “Los Angeles Stories” this week. Regular readers of the blog will know that Cooder is one of my favourite musicians, with his “Paradise and Lunch” being a top 10 album for me. It always frustrates me when world class musicians are also very talented in another artistic field – just doesn’t seem fair.

The stories are in what I believe is called the “LA Noir” genre. Kind of like short versions of LA Confidential. It’s amazing how quickly Cooder can set a scene and introduce several very believable characters.

I came across this music from Abdullah Ibrahim this week and have been enjoying it very much. Ibrahim is from Cape Town and is heavily influenced by Duke Ellington and Thelonius Monk. Apparently there’s a jazz sub-genre known as “Cape jazz” that this represents well.

In other music news, I was introduced to Ronnie Earl through this track:

Earl is from Boston and originally graduated with a degree in special education. After seeing a performance by Muddy Waters, he became interested in playing blues guitar professionally. He has been the associate professor of guitar at Berklee college of music for several years now.

Week in Review – September 2, 2018

A similar routine again this week to the last couple – Diana working in St. Petersburg, Florida Wednesday through Friday and me working at home. There were a couple of differences – Diana got stuck in Tampa due to a thunder storm around the time she was due to take off on Friday afternoon, and I had to drive to the Fort Worth office every day for all day meetings.

On the bright side, Diana was able to connect with Merry Lee and Jeff, have dinner at their country club, and then spend the night at their lovely new home in Tampa. She put a lot of work into making sure that her client presentation on Friday morning was successful and so it was good that she was able to relax with friends. She learned earlier on Friday afternoon that her Mum had been taken to the hospital by paramedics and was very concerned about being so far away from her – Jeff and Merry Lee were a welcome distraction. We just learned that her Mum could be discharged from hospital this afternoon and Diana will be in San Francisco tomorrow afternoon to make sure she settles in well back at home.

Meanwhile, I took advantage of being in Fort Worth all week to meet up with a colleague for dinner at the Capital Grille downtown. We walked from dinner to a jazz club called the Scat Lounge. On the way we passed by Sundance Square and downtown’s most iconic public art, the Chisholm Trail Mural which serves as a reminder of Fort Worth’s rich cultural roots. The three-story Richard Haas trompe l’oeil mural spans the 1908 Jett Building’s southern facade and was completed in 1988 to commemorate the Fort Worth segment of The Chisholm Trail cattle drives of 1867-1875.

I had been reading about the Scat Lounge for the last couple of years and was looking forward to trying it out. As luck would have it, a band named “A Taste of New Orleans” was playing on Wednesday night, and they were a real treat. Here are a couple of their performances.

The Scat Lounge is an excellent venue – just the right size and very reminiscent of a New York basement jazz club.

We met Patty and Brent for dinner and a movie on Saturday night. The movie was quite unique and different than you might expect – a true one of a kind dedicated “To Patty”. It featured Chad and his exploits over a 24 hour period. The version we saw was just the initial “rough cut” but a truly hilarious and very clever production.

After the movie, we enjoyed dinner at The Grape on Greenville Avenue (McD’s favourite Dallas restaurant). I enjoyed the Moroccan Rabbit “Tagine”, Brent the Crispy Pork Collar, and the ladies both had the Steak Frites. After dinner margaritas at the Blue Goose across the street put the ladies right off to sleep. What a lovely evening with great friends that we’re going to miss very much.

I finished a couple of very different books this week. The first, “The Sportswriter” by Richard Ford, is part of a trilogy that tracks the life of Frank Bascombe, a New Jersey based writer for a sports magazine. The book tracks his experiences over a long Easter weekend when he is 38 years old, having recently lost a child and been divorced.

I’ve heard Ford described as the poor man’s John Updike and particularly this trilogy compared unfavorably to Updike’s “Rabbit” trilogy. I found the writing styles quite different and, with several decades between the settings, the situation and scenarios quite different as well. I’m not ready to run out and read the rest of the trilogy but do look forward to catching up to them sometime soon. “Independence Day” from the trilogy won the Pulitzer prize for fiction in 1996.

The second book, “My Year of Rest and Relaxation” by Ottessa Moshfegh, was completely different than anything I typically read, and it’s probably good to try new things from time to time. I had read a positive review in the New Yorker magazine and it was the book club pick at the Wild Detectives book store that I love in South Dallas.

The narrator is a young woman, living in New York in the year 2000, and determined to withdraw from life for a year in order to escape from or cope with her traumas. The book is incredibly dark but the writing is very good. I would not recommend this book to the faint of heart.

Here’s a song I heard for the first time this week from the Chris Duarte Group. It reminds me a lot of “Tin Pan Alley” by Stevie Ray Vaughan and has equally good sound and production.

My boss just sent this picture from the Toronto air show this weekend. What amazing precision and a great picture that he took.

Week in Review – August 26, 2018

This week was very much a repeat of last week. A quiet week of work for me at home while Diana traveled to St. Petersburg again for work Wednesday through Friday. She had a successful but tiring trip and week.

I met Diana’s stepson, John, at the airport on Friday afternoon and took him to Perry’s steakhouse for a drink and a happy hour snack. He had an 8 hour layover in Dallas between returning from a business trip to Nashville and starting a business trip to Santiago, Chile (which sounds very exciting). Then Diana met up with both of us at the airport for a little while when she landed and I followed her home.

Diana treated me to dinner at Gregory’s on Saturday night and Brent joined. What a delicious feast! I had the weekly special – scallops with crawfish etouffee, goat cheese, and crumbled hatch chile cornbread. Diana had read about it and knew I would love it. We started with a gorgeous duck confit – apparently slow cooked for 36 hours – that just fell off the bone. Diana and Brent both had scallops “sea bass style” – over the lobster risotto that typically comes with my go-to Gregory’s choice, the sea bass. It’s so nice to have such amazing food available in walking distance from our home.

I finished the Paul Simon biography, “The Life”, this week. The book is almost 400 pages long and I still felt that some important areas were too short. I would have liked to have learned more about the recording processes and musicians involved in some of his great albums. That being said, there were many details on the inspirations behind the songs, and the challenges of getting just the right set of musicians and sounds in the studio. The section on the making of the Graceland (one of the original world music records) album in 1986 was very interesting as it described Simon traveling to South Africa, assembling the musicians, and trying to get the right sound.

One of my favorite passages covered the 2003 Simon and Garfunkel reunion tour (that I saw in San Jose) that included special guests the Everly Brothers. I remember the Everly Brothers being invited on stage midway through the show as Paul Simon told of them being one of the original inspirations for their music, and particularly remember a fantastic rendition of “Bye Bye Love” where Simon and Garfunkel sang with the Everly Brothers.

Another memorable passage talks about Simon performing at the 2006 New Orleans jazzfest, the first after Hurricane Katrina. Quint Davis, the organizer of jazzfest, is quoted as saying: “Paul and the music meant so much to everyone that there were a hundred thousand hands in the air and a hundred thousand eyes crying. The highlight was when he brought out Allen Toussaint and Irma Thomas to join him on “Bridge Over Troubled Water”. It was the most emotional moment that we’ve ever had at the festival. He wasn’t a musician. He was a hero.”

Here’s a song that I “Shazamed” from a movie that was playing in the background while I was reading – “Holes” by Mercury Rev from their 1998 album “Deserters Songs”. I hadn’t heard the band before and some quick research told me that this was their big break through album and included appearances by Levon Helm and Garth Hudson of The Band – no wonder it caught my attention as those are two of my favourite musicians.

Week in Review – August 19, 2018

This was another quiet week at home for me, with Diana traveling to St. Petersburg, Florida on Thursday and Friday, where she finished out a very busy work week.

McD solving an outage late into the night

We met Brent for coffee and a crossword after our workouts on Saturday morning. He refused to attempt the crossword after a quick glance over it – “I don’t have a crossword brain – good for puns and witty remarks, but not crosswords”. The time while not solving the crossword was put to good use – reading an article in the “Scientific Mind” on the fact that men with high testosterone also happen to be better dancers, hence the reason women are attracted to good dancers – honestly!

Saturday night brought a classic Texas torrential downpour and thunderstorm. This one lasted much longer than normal and provided the garden with a good soaking.

I finished the novel “Wonder Boys” by Michael Chabon this week. Chabon is perhaps my favorite author and the film from this book is also one of my favorites, so I had quite high hopes for this read. It did not disappoint. I enjoyed it more than Telegraph Avenue, which was one of my most enjoyable reads last year. The characters and crazy antics built around a writers celebration at a Pittsburgh college are excellent. It’s difficult to set aside visions of the actors who played the main characters – Michael Douglas, Robert Downey Jr., Katie Holmes, Tobey Maguire, and Patricia Clarkson – but I tried hard and enjoyed the written characters even more than the visual versions. I’m looking forward to catching up on some more of Chabon’s catalog in the near future.

Aretha Franklin passed away this week. “Live at the Fillmore West” is one of my top 10 live albums and I listened to it a couple of times this week. Aretha’s concert piano technique coupled with the versatility, soulfulness, and range of her voice make this album very special. Here’s a sample – a duet with the unforgettable Ray Charles:

Wow! – I’ve seen some amazing shows at the Fillmore in San Francisco, but nothing like this. One of my all time favorite Aretha performances was at the Kennedy Center Honors when she performed for Carole King’s induction – “Feel Like a Natural Woman”. The reactions from Carole and President Obama say it all.

An advertisement for a Blue Note concert by Maceo Paker, saxophonist for James Brown in the 1960s and Parliament Funkadelic in the 1970s, included a link to this video featuring Trombone Shorty from New Orleans. This might be the best trombone solo I’ve come across:

And finally on the music front, a music video that a friend turned me on to this week. The band is called Meute. They hail from Hamburg and describe their music as “German techno marching band”. I like the horn arrangements and performance very much.

Week in Review – August 12, 2018

A reasonably quiet week at home for both of us was a nice change. Lots of rain fell most days which took the edge of the scorching August heat a bit.

My parents, on the other hand, had great weather for their short getaway to Portpatrick. This is a picturesque, seaside village on the West coast of Scotland that we visited regularly as kids during our weekends and holidays in Glenluce. I’m reminded of ice cream cones enjoyed while wandering around the harbor, cliff walks with rock scrambling to a secluded beach, and mini golfing. Portpatrick is also a lifeboat station and I remember being amazed at the lifeboat that is fortified to enable rescues in extreme conditions. Mum and Dad seem to have had a very relaxing visit.

Our main activity this week was an outing to the Kessler on Saturday night with Brent. He found a new restaurant for us to try which is a very short walk from the Kessler as you can see up above. We’ve never ventured West past the theater before and so had been deprived of a great restaurant called Nova. This is a remodeled Dairy Queen burger shack and one of the owners told us that Stevie Ray Vaughan’s first job was there.

We really enjoyed Nova and look forward to returning soon to try more of the menu. It’s mostly Southern cooking but there are a wide variety of choices. Diana and I shared the crawfish and chorizo etouffee – absolutely delicious! We made it back to the theater in time for the complete opening act set (a rare feat for us) and were very pleased that Jeff (artistic director) had let us sneak in before heading to dinner to claim some good seats. Here’s an interesting article on Jeff’s background and the Kessler:

https://www.dallasobserver.com/music/a-day-in-the-life-of-kessler-theater-artistic-director-jeff-liles-10123991

He does an excellent job of booking talent into such a small theater (300 capacity with seated configuration) and manages the sound quality to an exceptionally high level.

Rob Baird opened the show with some acoustic country singer-songwriter music which we all enjoyed. Woodrow, the electric guitar player, joined him for most of the set and I think he is very talented and added some nicely nuanced guitar color to Rob’s songs.

It always adds to a show when the performer interacts with the audience via stories and anecdotes between songs and Rob did a superior job of that.

Monte Montgomery and his band were the main act. Diana and I had seen them a few years ago at the Granada theater and really enjoyed the show. We were not as impressed this time. Monte is a very skilled guitar player but sometimes all the fast notes and technique are just too much and the audience started to drift off after a while.

I love the “Live from Daryl’s House” show that started as a webcast and now is on network TV. Here’s a song from the episode that featured Monte with Daryl Hall.

Diana had a very busy work week and so enjoyed a nice, long nap on the drive home.

Sunday took us to the movie theater to watch the Christopher Robin film. What an all around treat – the story, the voices, and the animation were all perfect. Diana commented that it should be required viewing for all working parents. The Pooh voice was so perfect that we wondered if it was the same person that provided the voice in our youth – it was not but what a great job. I have to admit that I had completely forgotten about “Heffalumps”.

I’ve been listening to a new album from Boz Scaggs this week and enjoying it very much. Here’s a song from that:

Week in Review – August 5, 2018

Diana made her first business trip for her new job on Monday and Tuesday. The destination was San Jose and the meeting seems to have gone well. She was entertained to find a picture of an old typewriter in her room – they show up everywhere since we saw the California Typewriter movie.

This picture from her flight home shows the layer of smoke from the massive California wildfires that continue to burn. The Mendocino fire is now the largest in recorded history with close to 300,000 acres burned.

I dropped Diana off for her flight and we stopped into my favorite Dallas area coffee shop, Redefined coffee in Grapevine, for coffee and a crossword on the way. When I arrived at my office I found a nice new mousepad on my desk – a gift from Mike Mead that merges the Scottish and American flags in a creative way.

On Thursday we flew to Pensacola, Florida to rendezvous with Denny, Anne, Jack, Mason, and Sabine for a long weekend in Navarre beach. Anne’s parents, Carolyn and Jack, have a condo there that they live in during the winter months. Navarre beach is located on a very thin sliver of an island that parallels the coast – it takes just a couple of minutes to walk from the leeward to the gulf side of the island.

We stopped at the Union Public House in Pensacola for a drink and a snack before making the drive. The crab fingers and scotch eggs were very good.

Our next stop was at Joe Patti for fresh seafood. This place had the largest and most impressive array that I’ve seen – amazing variety. Denny picked up some scallops and lump crab meat.

Diana captured this picture of the gorgeous sandy beaches as we drove along the island. Here are some of the lovely views from the condo after we arrived.

Denny and Anne cooked up an amazing feast for dinner including perfectly cooked fresh scallops with tzatziki sauce. That was followed by a pretty wild game of cards against humanity which Mason won, just edging Denny and me.

Diana and I did some work calls first thing in the morning and after a late, lazy breakfast, we headed over to the beach on Friday and stayed there until a thunder storm rolling in from offshore seemed ready to soak us. Then we headed to T.J.s in Navarre proper on the mainland for a late lunch.

Our Friday night entertainment was a walk down to Juana’s to listen to the live band. The music was classic rock which everyone (except maybe Denny) enjoyed. The people watching in the music section of the bar was some of the best I’ve seen in a while with all kinds of characters involved. It became clear why the floor of the bar was nice soft sand.

Saturday morning was a repeat of Friday with a trip over to the beach. The current and waves were much calmer and so we were able to spend some more time playing in the sea. Lunch was at Windjammer on the pier where Anne and Diana had found some impressive sand art on their earlier walk down the beach.

Sunday morning brunch was amazing crab benedicts assembled by Chef Denny, Anne with a small contribution from me. After brunch we enjoyed some quality time on the massive blow up island in the water out behind the condo. Diana tried out Anne’s paddleboard and did very well – no falling at all.

D paddle boarding – should she be that far out?

Then it was that awful time again – time to leave the Ogans and fly home to boring, land-locked McKinney. Thanks to Mr. Denny for driving us to the Pensacola airport. The candle that Anne gifted to Diana caused some brief interest from the Pensacola TSA staff.

My cigar cutter and ashtray set up caused me to be stopped for a bag check on the way out of Dallas to Pensacola and I was lucky to get a TSA agent who was also a cigar aficionado and let it pass. So we were able to get extra screening on both legs of the trip.

Jack had Anne send us home with a gift from him (one that didn’t alert TSA) – a piece of wine cork art that is now hanging in our bar area.

A huge thanks to Jack and Carolyn for the use of their condo for an excellent long weekend!

My reading this week has been from the new Paul Simon biography. I’m about half way through and around 1974 when “Still Crazy After All These Years” was released. This has been a very interesting read – I enjoy hearing about the inspiration for the songs and the special recording techniques and musicians used on the various albums. I was interested to learn that the Muscle Shoals “Swampers” were the key musicians on the “Rhymin’ Simon” album – one of my favorites. It’s amazing how many of the records that I love were recorded at Muscle Shoals with that great cadre of musicians.

Here’s a song from that album:

Denny turned me on to a great version of “As Long as I Can See the Light” by My Morning Jacket while we were in Navarre:

And to finish out the music section this week, here’s an excellent song by Little Richard with Jimi Hendrix on guitar and Billy Preston on organ that I heard about through the Immortal Jukebox blog (highly recommended):

Week in Review – July 29, 2018

The week started out with a pretty significant packing oopsy! I arrived at DFW airport and realized that I hadn’t packed any trousers for my trip to New York and was wearing shorts – not ideal for the office environment.

As a result, Monday started with an early morning walk to Target, which didn’t have any dress pants at all, and then a walk to Century 21 where I was successful. It was rainy and very humid for the walk as you can see from the misty top of the Freedom Tower. I did find a great coffee shop to dry out in next to Target where I enjoyed a delicious beet humus (seems to be an increasingly popular option) and avocado toast and heard this interesting music playing.

Tinariwen is a Grammy Award-winning group of Tuareg musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. The band was formed in 1979 in Tamanrasset, Algeria, but returned to Mali after a cease-fire in the 1990s. I like the rhythmic and repetitive guitar sound and it reminds me a lot of an album I have from 1994 with Ry Cooder and Ali Farka Toure (also from the Saharan desert region) titled “Talking Timbuktu”.

My first New York musical outing was to Birdland to see the Birdland Big Band. They are a 16 piece band with lots of brass and perform at the club every Friday evening and for a two week residency in the summer. I enjoyed the mix of musical styles they offered and even one of a few songs they did with a singer named Veronica swift – “Someone to Watch Over Me”.

A couple of evenings later I was able to catch a performance by the blues guitarist Walter Trout at the Highline Ballroom next to Chelsea Market. Trout had a liver transplant a few years ago and was so sick that he had to learn to talk and play guitar after surgery, taking several years to regain all of his skills. I didn’t love the show but did enjoy the venue and particularly a young guitarist named Solomon Hicks whom Trout invited to join him for a couple of songs.

I finished out the work week with a delicious Mediterranean dinner with colleagues at a new find named “Nish Nush” on John Street. The falafel trio was excellent with the best falafels and sauces that I’ve had. I’m looking forward to returning when I’m back in the area.

On the short walk back to my hotel, I thought I heard a band playing on the plaza outside the JP Morgan building, but further investigation showed that it was Thursday movie night with “Back to the Future”. I walked up right as the “flux capacitor” was being introduced.

I had a full day of meetings on Friday and headed to La Guardia airport at 5pm in a rain storm. My flight was scheduled to leave at 8pm and was constantly pushed back as the thunder storm continued to hover above the airport. The incoming flight was eventually diverted to Pittsburg for refueling and ultimately arrived around midnight. We landed in Dallas after 3am and it was close to 4:30am when I got home – a long day to say the least.

I was able to rally for a workout, coffee and crossword with Diana on Saturday morning but got very sleepy in the afternoon.

Week in Review – July 15, 2018

We arrived in Glasgow via Houston and London Heathrow on Thursday afternoon in time to celebrate my Mum’s 80th birthday. Diana did a nice job of wrapping her gift, a necklace with birthstones for each of the grandchildren, in a fancy stack. We were amazed at the array of 80th birthday cards – no two the same. You just don’t get that kind of selection with us. The weather during our visit was perfect and a very nice change from the 100 degree temperatures that we left behind in Dallas.

On Friday we decided to take a trip up to Glasgow in the afternoon. We parked at Buchanan Galleries and enjoyed lunch in Princes Square. It was fun to observe the various buskers along Buchanan Street and to see all the people enjoying their lunch al fresco. As we were leaving I spotted a dinosaur exhibit in the shopping mall and was able to coax McD into hatching from a dino egg.

On Saturday we went for a walk along the front at Troon which came with a stop for ice cream at a kiosk by the beach. David brought Penelope’s Cousin (PC), his new Porsche Cayman GTS, to Merrick View for a visit in the afternoon and then we went for an exhilarating drive on the Fenwick road.

Saturday evening brought the 80th birthday celebration dinner at Lochgreen. This is the same place where we had my Dad’s birthday party and we reprised family pictures before going in for dinner.

We had a lovely meal and Lorna provided one of her typically creative birthday cakes.

We slept in late on Sunday and then David took us to Brig o’ Doon for coffee and a snack in the afternoon. President Trump was leaving from Prestwick airport and the traffic of protestors and observers made for a slower than normal trip. The Brig o’ Doon is situated in Alloway, home of Scotland’s most famous poet, Robert Burns. His poem, Tam o’ Shanter, finishes with his trusty horse, Meg, helping him escape witches giving chase after a night of too much imbibing. Meg makes it across the Brig o’ Doon only by shedding her tail to the witch. Here is the original verse and a translation.

There was a wedding going on and so we were asked to move out of the backdrop for the wedding pictures as we posed atop Brig o’ Doon.

That’s Heather’s new boyfriend, Michael, holding her hand as they ascend the bridge. He seems like a lovely young man in spite of being vegan. I got a picture of Diana under a line from another of Burns’ poems that I sang for her on St. Valentine’s day. My Mum commented that the gesture wasn’t complete without presentation of a red rose to accompany the song.

We enjoyed a lovely dinner of my Mum’s famous boeuf bourguignon and individual pavlovas on Sunday evening before Heather, David and Struan had to head back to Aberdeen for work on Monday.

I finished a couple of books this week. “Famous Father Girl” by Jamie Bernstein tells of her life growing up as the daughter of Leonard Bernstein. I enjoyed this very much – particularly her stories about her Dad preparing to conduct some of the famous symphonies around the world.

The other was “Still Alice” by Lisa Genova. I loved “Every Note Played” earlier this year and my Mum had left this one on the bedside table for me to read during the visit. I enjoyed this one very much as well – Genova does an amazing job of capturing what it must feel like to face the onset of early Alzheimer’s.