A Fun and Busy Weekend

Friday, January 28, 2011

We had an active and enjoyable weekend here at home that started with dinner Friday night, with our friends, John and Dorie, who recently got married and are expected their first child in May. Congrats, guys!!

After dinner we met up with some other friends: Sharon, Paige, and her husband, Paul, at Zanies Comedy Club to catch a show that was headlined by Jo Koy. He's a regular on one of our favorite TV shows, Chelsea Lately, a week-nightly, half-hour round table that pokes fun at Hollywood. His opener comic was Adam Hammer who was very funny. Jo came on around 10 PM and, man, it was on. He had us and the sold-out crowd in stitches for well over an hour. Definitely one of the best shows we have seen at Zanies ever. He stuck around afterwards to sign autographs and take silly pictures (left) and we were able to meet him. He's an extremely nice person who really enjoys meeting his fans and claims Nashville as one of his favorite cities to visit. I guess they all say that, but Jo really did seem to be enjoying himself while in Music City. Saturday, January 29, 2011

We called it a night after that because we had plans to get up fairly early (for a Saturday) and take a 5-mile hike at Cedars of Lebanon State Park in our own Wilson County that was being sponsored by the Nashville Hikers Meet-Up Group. They had chosen to hike the Hidden Springs Trail which we haven't done before and it was to be led by Randy Hedgepath, a long-time naturalist for the state of Tennessee who we have hiked with before and really enjoy. The weather was mild and clear for late January and that got a good crowd of 25 or so to show up for the hike. It's a fairly easy hike in terms of terrain and Randy (photo below), as always, kept the walk lively and informative with many stops along the way pointing out trees, plants and animals that we encountered. The namesake of the trail, Hidden Springs, is a beautiful small, but deep, chasm in the limestone with a flowing spring in the bottom of it. The loop trail is really only 4.2 miles and as Randy admitted, Tennessee state parks have a tendency to round up trail lengths to keep things simple and compensate for effort as well. We finished up at around 3 hours and headed home to shower after the muddy-at-times hike and rest a bit before heading back to Nashville for dinner and a concert.

We had dinner in Nashville at Bombay Palace Indian Restaurant on West End Avenue near Vanderbilt. Ashlee has been here a few times before with a girlfriend of hers, but we had never been together. It was excellent. The entrees were authentic and very tasty. The portions were plentiful and the prices were very affordable. When we walked in the place at 6:30 (it's easiest to come in the backdoor thru the kitchen), there weren't many people in the place, but by the time we left, every table in the small restaurant was full. The staff are extremely pleasant and polite. We will definitely be back here again. After dinner we headed over to 12th & Porter, a live music venue near downtown. The building used to also house one of our favorite restaurants in Nashville, also called 12th & Porter, but, alas, it is gone now and a nightclub/bar has taken its place. Too bad...we really miss those great pasta dishes (here's to you: Pasta Ya-Ya and Black & Blue Pasta) that they served. The live music venue hasn't changed at least. It's still a great little general-admission club with a large stage and plenty of room to stand in front of it, plus an upstairs balcony with a few chairs. We got there when the doors opened and commandeered a couple of the precious bar stools in the balcony for the night since our legs were a little tired from the hike earlier in the day. And it was going to be a long night as there were two opening bands before the headliner that we came to see, Truth & Salvage Company.

First up was Mockingbird Sun, a three-part harmony Americana/country quartet whose sound was reminiscent of the Zac Brown Band. They are from Nashville and their 30-minute set was very enjoyable. Next up was A Thousand Horses, a very young Nashville-based pure rock-n-roll band that looked and sounded like they had been playing together for years. Their original songs were strong and this could be a band that makes some noise in the future. Their lead singer is definitely channeling some early Stephen Tyler of Aerosmith fame in his look and vocals. Their 45-minute set seemed to just fly by. The place was packed while they played and then seemed to clear out a bit afterwards. Obviously, these boys had a lot of friends and family come see them play which we benefited from with an excellent performance.

Around 11 PM, Truth & Salvage Company (photo above) hit the stage in full force. We first saw these guys at Bonnaroo last summer and really enjoyed them. The band itself is fairly new with their first album released last year, but the six members are all veterans of the Americana/alt-country scene and are a combination of two different previous bands. Of the six members, four of them share lead singer duties which is kind of different and definitely gives every song a different sound. They played well past midnight to a sold-out house, covering their whole first album with a little Lynrd Skynard cover thrown in for good measure. By the time we got home, we were exhausted but happy to have had such a great day of different experiences.

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Sunday we slept in to recover from our previous 36 hours of being on the go, but by mid-afternoon we were able to muster enough energy to head back to Nashville to catch a matinee showing of "127 Hours" with our friends Danny, Carolyn and Paige. It's got our vote as Best Picture for the upcoming Oscars. It's an amazing true story and the film does it all the justice it deserves. Great directing by Danny Boyle and a strong performance in the lead role by James Franco.