The weekend Thread

[bigoldron]

I would say that we carried our youth from the church to Mercer University in Macon for "Baptist Youth Day", but the only one's who showed up were the youth pastor, my 18 year old and me. So, we left about 6:30 and got there in time to meet up with my daughter's "friend". He's a guy met a while back and they've been texting back and forth. Supposedly not a "serious" thing, but I'm not buying that. Anyway, he's seems to be a good kid and his minister of music (one of our friends who moved away) gives him a good recommendation, so I'm not losing any sleep right now. Plus, he's 5 hours away...

Anyway, the day was good, not a very big crowd, but we did find out it was the 1st time, so you have to start somewhere. We heard and met a really good Christian rock band (JJ Weeks Band), who's based in Macon. They did a really good job, especially for 10:30 on a Saturday morning. Got their contact info so we can maybe get them down here.

After that, we heard a couple of short speeches, did a brief campus tour and had lunch. At 1:30, we got to watch the Mercer men's team play Jacksonville State. It was a really good game. Fairly even matchup, not too rambunctious a crowd. JSU got up to a 10 point lead in the second half, but Mercer came back and made a 2 pointer with 10.2 seconds left to go ahead 71-70 and managed to hang on for the win. It got very exciting in the last minute or two and the crowd was on its feet for that. Afterwards, we said our goodbyes and had a (thankfully) uneventful ride home.

Yesterday, we went to church in the morning, had a birthday lunch for my father-in-law and went to Mama's and cooked hamburgers for her birthday yesterday afternoon. Both of them have 2/9 for their birthday. FIL is 67, Mama's 70 today. So overall, it was a pretty good weekend, just too short.

[Brian Krashpad]

That's a shame more kids didn't go to that music thing Ron.

That reminds me-- isn't Macon where Gretsch is headquartered?

Sounds like you had fun anyhow between that and the birthdays!

[bigoldron]

That's a shame more kids didn't go to that music thing Ron.

That reminds me-- isn't Macon where Gretsch is headquartered?

Sounds like you had fun anyhow between that and the birthdays!

Well popularity/familiarity is a funny thing. If we'd said we were going to Athens to UGA, we'd probably have to carry 2 buses. Macon is a private Baptist college (read that as "expensive"), plus there's no football, so you can imagine how much popularity that it generates around South Georgia.

Yep. Gretsch is headquartered in Macon. Saw that last year when I took my Number 2 daughter to the Georgia Music Hall of Fame.

It was a really good weekend. Shame I have to be at work today.

[Brian Krashpad]

Friday I loaded up my van with a backline for a birthday party at my friend's house on Saturday. His actual birthday was 2/14, but since that's Valentine's Day he re-scheduled the party to this weekend. All five original members of our college-days party band, the Band of Fools, attended. One guy lives in England most of the year and comes into town for a few months during the winter. A couple of the other guys drove up from downstate, one from Tampa and one from Orlando.

Obviously we didn't practice or anything, just threw together a few songs on the fly, with a guy sitting in on drums so our original drummer could play guitar. It was pretty cold out, and that didn't help with the guitars staying in tune either. At least the cops didn't show up.

My daughter played bass on a couple songs, which was the first time she had ever played with a band or in front of people. Here's a few hilarious/painful seconds of that, sorry about the weird keyboards, that's what happens when people drink too much! Pretty bad when the only one not making a fool of herself is the teenager.



Sunday morning I had to get up early despite not getting home until 1:30 a.m., because my son was acolyting/crucifering at church. Stopped for lunch on the way home, then later in the late afternoon I drove back up to my friend's house and loaded all the stuff back up. Went from my friend's house to my office for band practice. Since I had a little 2x10 cab I bought for my daughter to practice at home with me (had used at the party for bass), I tried out the 2x10 cab at band practice in combo with a Hartke 4x10 and it sounded great. I think a 1x15 with the 2x10 might even be better for the contrast.

How was your weekend?

[Spudman***]

Sounds experimental. I like it.

[Brian Krashpad]

Sounds experimental. I like it.

Haha, if experimental means "bad," yeah.

Oh well, everyone had fun. Lotsa people and some I hadn't seen in years.

[bigoldron]

Oh well, everyone had fun. Lotsa people and some I hadn't seen in years.

That's what it's supposed to be about. Glad ya'll had fun! Does your daughter have a learners permit yet? She could double as the bus driver.

Wait a minute, did I see in one of your posts that her name is "Hannah Beth"? Too weird. My older one is Carabeth and my baby girl is Annabeth, affectionately know around town as the "Beth Girls". I get called Ronnie Beth way too much because of it.

[Spudman***]

I get called Ronnie Beth way too much because of it.

That's probably going to start happening here now too. Ronnie Beth.:

[marnold***]

Sounds like a Johnny Cash tune: The Ballad of Ronnie Beth

[Kazz]

Hey Ronnie Beth......

[Brian Krashpad]

That's what it's supposed to be about. Glad ya'll had fun! Does your daughter have a learners permit yet? She could double as the bus driver.

Wait a minute, did I see in one of your posts that her name is "Hannah Beth"? Too weird. My older one is Carabeth and my baby girl is Annabeth, affectionately know around town as the "Beth Girls". I get called Ronnie Beth way too much because of it.

Yes, she does have a learner's permit. She can be my designated driver!

And yep, we call her Hannah Beth, her name is Hannah (for a great-great-grandmother) Elizabeth (for a great-aunt). Since Hannah was/is a popular girl's name we knew she'd probably have other Hannahs in her classes and such, but that there probably woudn't be any other Hannah Beths. Now at school I think she's shortened it and just goes by Hannah, but at home we call her Hannah Beth a lot still.

In Spanish we call her Annabel, which is the name I think she uses in her school Spanish classes.

[sunvalleylaw]

This weekend, I coached the Freeride ski team on Saturday and had basically a normal day. Today, I took the dogs for a nordic skate ski (the crust cruising, where you go out on the open land rather than on the groomed track) was great! Then I took my 5 year old daughter skiing at Dollar Mountain, the beginner hill at Sun Valley. We had a great time, singing the "Sharpay" version of "You are the music in me" and dancing all around the hill. Then we had a cookout in our backyard during the driving snowstorm, roasting snausages and hotdogs and making S'mores, washed down with some red wine brought over by my Mother in Law!



Now my boys, who had a friend each over for a sleep over, are bedding down in the tent in the living room for a "camp out" It is spring break, and since we aren't going anywhere this year, we are having our own spring campout/cookout. Good spring times! :

[bigoldron]

Sounds like a great weekend, Steve!

[Spudman***]

Oh I'm so envious - you got the storm and we didn't. We got wind but no precip or clouds really.

Cool tent in the living room. That's really roughing it without the fly.

[sunvalleylaw]

No storm huh? Did you get your ride in then? Beat into the wind and coast back?

[Spudman***]

No storm huh? Did you get your ride in then? Beat into the wind and coast back?

Nope. I was busy saving all sentient beings.

[Brian Krashpad]

Brr.

My weekend started inauspiciously enough, got a call from my wife Friday morning that our son's middle school had called, he had felt sick and was sent to the nurse and got sick while at the nurse's. My wife was getting her nails done, so I went to go pick him up at school.

Since I already had plans for a rare weekday lunch, my wife met me at the place I was going to eat with some old college/band buddies, and she took Jack home from there. By odd conicidence the guitarist in my very first band currently works at UF doing some scientific thingies with the bassist in one of my current side bands, and he brought said bassist along. However that side band really exists only on paper at this point, as the frontman/singer-songwriter for it lives over in St. Augustine (a couple hours away).

The bassist had grown hs hair out long and had a full beard-- I hadn't seen him in probably a year, so I didn't even recognize him. Our fourth was my friend Albert, the keyboard player in that clip above.

We had a nice lunch, although I learned that our mutual friend Tom, who had been in a band with me and the bassist, Brad, and is basically my guitar tech when I need repairs, was separated from his wife. He is probably at least 20 years older than she is, but they had been together for 20 years or so, since she was 16. She's already living with some guy. I just don't get that. At least there are no kids involved.

I had already planned to stop by and see Tom after lunch anyhow, so I stopped at the music store where he works and we chatted awhile.

Went back to the office but had been putting in such long hours that I basically just collected up my stuff and went home for the weekend.

Unfortunately, it turned out our son had a bad stomache virus, rather than just some food poisoning or a 24-hour bug. He was running fever and my wife made the mistake of letting him sleep in our bed and watch TV that evening. He got to feeling better and had some pretzels, and then barfed all over the bed.

Fun evening that was.

Saturday we took it easy, Jack was still sick and neither I nor my wife felt very good either, although Kim felt worse than I did. Mainly did a lot of laundry.

Sunday morning I went up to the little town of High Springs and picked up a practice amp so I'll have something I can use to play in church. It's a little 40W Crate, I will put the deets in a separate thread.

Came home, played around with the new (to me) amp, and did more laundry and just hung out. Jack was feeling a bit better, and Sunday was his birthday, so Kim went out and got him a cake and some presents, and Sunday evening we had pizza and ice cream and cake out on our patio. It was nice, probably in the high 70's or maybe even low 80's F. Just the four of us. Kim had bought one of those portable "fire pit" things so we built a fire in it even though it was a little warm for that.

Kim took some pics of Sunday evening, maybe I will be able to post them this evening.

[Brian Krashpad]

Played guitar in church Sunday morning, first song was a pre-service song, U2's "40." Of course, my delay pedal was busted, that's always fun trying to play U2 with no delay. So I cranked up the chorus and the reverb and faked it. It actually went OK though. On that song it was me on electric and the pianist/singer used my beater 12-string Yamaha. On one of the service songs I missed an intro, because the flautist started playing without giving me a count in, so I just waited to come in with the piano, rather than jump in late. Fortunately no major screw-ups that were really noticeable.

I'm still a bit nervous playing there. At my last church (a couple years ago) the band was off to the side and I mainly played seated, and sorta hid behind the organ console. Here, I'm up front and there are like several hundred people facing me. I used my new (to me) little 2x8 40W Crate and it sounded fine, did not run through the PA, which is how I prefer anyhow. Played the Les Paul Classic with the '52 RI Tele in reserve (wanted the praise band leader to not have a chance to judge me poorly based on gear, so brought the more expensive stuff). Still getting used to doing the little descending bass-note chords one sees in church music again. The pianist/singer/praise band leader leader asked me if I'd be available to play more than the one Sunday per month that my "team" plays, and I said sure, he apparently doesn't have any electric guitarists on any of the other teams, so if there's a song that's a bit more "rock" maybe I'll get to sit in with some of the other teams.

Saturday I'd dropped my daughter off at the botanical gardens, they were having a big Spring event with plant sales, bands, etc., before I went to church for my band practice. She spent all afternoon with her new "boyfriend" but reportedly no PDA as yet. It went well though-- I checked her facebook and her friend left a little heart on her wall. Back at Casa Krashpad after church band practice, all day was spent doing laundry and folding and putting away, and picking up the house for Jack's belated birthday party Sunday afternoon.

After I got back from church on Sunday at about 1 pm, I went out into the front yard with the grass whip and took out all the weeds, then fired up the mower and mowed the worst parts of the back yard, and leaf-blew the drive and front walk and porch, before people got there for the birthday party. We did everything out on the back patio, the weather was perfect today, 70's F, cool and breezy. The kids who came all got a Nerf gun as their party favor, so they had Nerf battles for a couple hours, in between gift-opening and cake and ice cream. Nice low-profile inexpensive party, and perfect for 12-year-old boys.

Howzabout y'all?

[bigoldron]

Sounds like a nice weekend, Brian. Congrats on getting the chance to play more at church. Apparently, the leader/director recognizes talent when he sees it! (Be positive dude, don't say "apparently he has no other guitarist).

We spent Saturday working in the yard. I planted 15 azaleas and 5 dogwood trees, got my lawn mower running (spent 45 minutes running down an air pump), and finally got the grass cut. Sunday morning was the usual, except I got the new keyboard at the church set up for pianist/keyboard player that morning and we had a gospel quartet come for the evening service.

Say a prayer my kids in the youth praise band. Next Sunday night is our Community-Wide 5th Sunday Service, where the local churches get together have singing, dancing and other forms of worship. This time it's "youth oriented", so my kids and I will be playing. They get a little nervous when we're not in our church, but I think they'll be fine.