From Live on the GREEN to Live at RED Rocks and a birthday in between.

Thursday, Sept. 4 - We enjoyed a little impromptu East Nashville Pub Crawl tonight with our friends, Tiff and Brenda, who were up from Chattanooga for a visit.  We started with dinner at the always-great Drifter's BBQ and then it was on for drinks at Bar 308, a cool little gin-joint we've been wanting to visit.  We ended the evening at the Holland House Bar and Refuge which we hadn't been to in a long while and had forgotten what a cool place it is. We've definitely got to come back here for dinner sometime.

Friday, Sept. 5 - We had VIP tickets for Live on the Green  tonight (their first time expanding into a weekend event) with Augustana with our friends, Wayne, Chris and Tarryn.

Good food and drinks, clean bathrooms and front row views of Augustana in action.  You gotta love VIP tickets at Live on the Green in downtown Nashville.  Always a good time.

Saturday, Sept. 6 - Today we had VIP tickets again this time to see Ingrid Michaelson and LP at Live on the Green.  The weather was little steamy, but the rain held off which was most important.

This was our first time "seeing" the lovely Ingrid play live.  We "heard" her live at Bonnaroo a few years back but the crowd was so big at the tent she was playing at that we couldn't even glimpse her on the stage.  She put on a terrific hour-long set today including a surprise duet with another of our favorite performers, Mat Kearney.  The  most amazing fact was that this was Ingrid's first show since losing her mother only a week before.  We feel privileged that she didn't cancel the show which she had every right to do, and her stirring cover of Coldplay's "Sky Full of Stars" that was dedicated to her mom to end the show was downright beautiful.  Thank you so much, Ingrid.

 

LPVerified account‏@iamlp

Yeah man !!... ;)...RT @decadeofduke: @lprock @Lightning100 Get this amazing singer on @LiveOnTheGreen this fall!!

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11:05 PM - 19 Feb 2014

Note the date at the bottom of the Twitter post above.  Well, that tweet worked pretty well!  I tweeted in February and it became a reality in September!

The angelically-voiced LP wowed the crowd at Live on the Green with a full hour of songs from her debut album.  Lots of folks knew the words to her songs and lots more folks became instant fans after her incredible performance.

 

LPVerified account‏@iamlp

Thank u Nashville and @Lightning100 and @LiveOnTheGreen !! Had an amazing time!! #YourTown #isbesttownever

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8:28 AM - 7 Sep 2014

Sept. 12 - 13:  We celebrated Ashlee's birthday weekend in two different cities.  We had dinner at Alleia in Chattanooga on Friday with her family and some friends, and at Suzy Wong's House of Yum in Nashville on Saturday with a bunch of other friends.  And the Baskins Robbins ice cream cake I got her was the bomb, ya'll!

September 19-21:  We took a quick trip out to Denver, Colorado for a Grace Potter and the Nocturnals show at Red Rocks Amphitheater (BUCKET LIST - CHECK!)

We flew in after work on Friday night along with our friends, Wayne and Bridgette.  This was our first time in downtown Denver and we had a great time exploring a bit on Saturday morning before the show including some shopping at the huge REI flagship store.

Red Rocks is a natural park that just happens to have an awesome amphitheater in it as well.  We saw a beautiful heard of mule deer as we hiked up to the venue entrance from the parking lot.

It was an anxious crowd waiting for the gates to open.  

The place is simply breath-taking and the sound was out of this world.  Despite the fair skies at sunset, we did magically dodge some thunderstorms that swept across the area with only a few drops of rain hitting us and no stopping of the show that included two great openers, Lake Street Dive, and the tremendous Trombone Shorty and Orleans Avenue.  That's downtown Denver poking out of the horizon way off in the distance.

Ship Rock to the south (photo above), Creation Rock to the north and Stage Rock behind the performers make up the amazing set of "walls" to this natural amphitheater.

We are just out of this shot (courtesy of Grace Potter and the Nocturnals) behind the mixing boards.  There's not a bad seat in the place, but we were dead center for the whole amazing show, their first as headliners here.

Grace Potter ‏@gracepotter  3h

Space-y!! RT @decadeofduke: who knew my favorite shot from the @gracepotter @RedRocksOnline show would be a goof. pic.twitter.com/Vuqk8NcF7o

It was honor to get my "garbage-to-gold" photo from the show retweeted by Grace herself as well as posted on the band's Facebook page.  I wish I could say this was anything but a beautiful accident.

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Monday morning before heading home, we were able to take a guided hike at Eldorado Canyon State Park near Boulder, Colorado.  We did a +5-mile loop that swung beneath the Devil's Thumb which you can see jutting above the Flatiron Mountains in the photo above.  Thanks to the wetter-than-normal summer, the wildflowers were still brilliant despite the time of year.

The Maiden of the Mountain was another massive stone obelisk that we passed during our hike.

After the hike, it was time to cool off with some tasty micro-brews and chow down on some great grub at Southern Sun Pub & Brewery in  nearby downtown Boulder.   Those are my two different IPA half-pints in the foreground and Ashlee's raspberry wheat ale in the background.  All were excellent.

It was a quick trip, but a memorable one.  We got to cross Red Rocks off our Bucket List, see one of our favorite bands again for the umpteenth time and take in a little Rocky Mountain wilderness. We had a lot of laughs along the way (and learned some tough lessons about edibles).   Our friend, Wayne, snapped this amusing picture at the Denver Airport on our way home.  This happy family was actually sitting in a hallway waving at folks through this window as they came through security.  Why?  Who knows?  But they were having fun and it had to make you smile a bit.

August Happenings

Another busy month for us as we wind down a fun Summer of 2014

Saturday, August 2 - It was another luxurious overnight stay at The Inn of Fontanel for us as geared up for The Soulshine Tour making a final stop at The Woods Amphitheater at Fontanel starring some of our favorite musical performers including Trevor Hall, Brett Dennen, and Michael Franti and Spearhead.  We had the larger Guest House Lower Suite booked this time and it was awesome.

Did we mention it was luxurious?  Ashlee claims this is the greatest bathtub she's ever soaked in.

We were having such a great time hanging out at the inn with our friends Chris and Tarryn, who also came up for the show, that we missed Trevor Hall's quick opening set, but he made several appearances throughout the rest of the show at least.  Brett Dennen was up next and we caught most of his set.  He seemed a little "spirited" in his always-enjoyable performance, some of which is captured in the video below from our great vantage point near the stage.  Soja was the third band to play and we enjoyed their unique reggae sound for the first time live.

Michael Franti and his band, Spearhead, put on another dynamite show to close out the evening with appearances from all the previous performers as well.  Tarryn even got a big hug from him after the show.  He's the best about hanging out after a performance.

Saturday, August 9 - Monday, August 11: We continued the "staycation of luxury" theme the following weekend with our third visit to Evins Mill Resort over in nearby Smithville, TN.  We got to enjoy a buy-one, get-one night deal in their newest addition, the Solstice building.  Our room was large and lovely and the entire unit is nestled in among the trees.  Totally peaceful.  We even had the whole building to ourselves on Sunday night since no other guests were staying there.

Our choice of revisiting Evins Mill  this particular weekend was two-fold since Calfkiller Brewing Company in nearby Sparta was having a tasting and pairing with the Evins Mill dinner on Saturday night.  We tried all four of their offerings and were impressed by each.  Dinner was delicious and abundant, as usual, as was the fare on Sunday night.  The breakfasts that are included with the room rate are awesome too as was the box lunches they provided us on Sunday.  Worth every penny and I bet we come back again if given the chance.

OK, make the reason we came back to Evins Mill this weekend three-fold.  We also wanted a chance to swim beneath Carmac Falls which is located on the resort's property.  We hadn't had an opportunity to do so during over previous two visits, but we got our chance on Sunday afternoon with warm, sunny weather and, amazingly, in complete privacy also.  Can't beat that!  The short video below shows Ashlee daring to take a dip even after the fact she spied a snake in the water a bit earlier.  Fear...conquered...for the most part.  

Friday, August 22 - We had dinner at Watermark Restaurant tonight to take advantage of some good pricing for Nashville Restaurant Week. Our friends, Danny and Brenda, joined us and we had a fancy and delicious three-course dinner for 30 buck each. We decided to go see Guardians of the Galaxy in IMAX after dinner.  All of us but Ashlee had seen it before.  In fact, it was the 3rd time for me and Brenda.  It's not exactly Ashlee's preferred type of flick, but she was a good sport and wound up enjoying it actually.

Saturday, August 23- We got up this morning and headed over to LP Field to have our picture taken and turned into a banner for this season's "Hall of Fans."  We got this honor by actually winning four Tennessee Titans season tickets.  Plus, they gave us a nice bag of Titans' swag as well.  Big thanks to the Tennessee Titans organization for this generous prize!  We even took the elevator to the wrong floor going out of the stadium and wound up getting a couple goofy pictures in the team's on-field vehicles. What a hoot!  

     We spent the afternoon cooling off from the high temps at  Nashville Shores Water Park.  This was my first time there, but Ashlee's been a few times this summer and even got a season pass because she likes it so much.  We had a ball riding all the big water slides and lazing about in their Lazy River.  What a great place right in our own backyard.

Sunday, August 24 - We stole the term "Sunday, Funday" from a hilarious new TV sit-com called "You're the Worst" and applied it to a full day out and about doing pretty much nothing of any real value other than...you guessed it...having fun.    We started with brunch at M.L, Rose's in downtown Nashville.   We then moseyed south to where we had a bottle of wine on the covered porch with a nice breeze at Arrington Vineyards.  Next, it was a drink at the now-TV-(in)famous dive bar over in Murfreesboro, MT Bottles and Cans.  We had an early dinner at O'Possums Irish Pub in Murfreesboro with our friend, Emily.  The food was excellent. We finished up with a drink at the rather underwhelming Brew U also in Murfreesboro. Overall, a very good Sunday, Funday!

Music, Baseball and BACON!!

Thursday, July 10 - We caught a great FREE set by Sister Sparrow and the Dirty Birds tonight downtown on the riverfront at Nashville Dancin' (formerly Dancin' in the District). We got right up in the front row and enjoyed the beautiful weather and the great show by this band we discovered at Bonnaroo a few years ago. We had dinner beforehand at Hana House of Sushi in Mt. Juliet.

The Cumberland River, the Shelby Street Pedestrian Bridge and the edge of downtown made for quite a panoramic backdrop for  Sister Sparrow and the Dirty Birds as they jammed away at Nashville Dancin' tonight.

Friday, July 18 - We caught a showing of the hilarious comedy sequel, 22 Jump Street, tonight at our local Mt. Juliet theater for free thanks to some passes we won at an Oscar party hosted by our friend Brenda way back in January.

Saturday, July 19 - Tonight was our first of two scheduled overnight stays this summer at the beautiful, new Inn at Fontanel.  We picked this night since we were also seeing The Fray play at The Woods Amphitheater on the same property up in White's Creek north of Nashville.  While this is a "local" venue, it's a pretty long haul back home after a late show, so when they converted the Southern Living Idea House that we visited last year (see previous blog) into a small hotel, we knew it was worth a try despite the kind of high price tag.  We will be staying again in a few weeks for the Michael Franti show, but in a different, larger room.  We had a great stay in the "North Bunkie" room which included a large cooked-to-order breakfast the next morning.

 

The FrayVerified account‏@TheFray

Nashville... Pretty much our second home. Excited to play @WoodsAtFontanel tonight. Come on out! -BW #HeliosTour

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10:50 AM - 19 Jul 2014

The Fray were tremendous live.   Their Tweet (shown above) from before the show was an indication that they love this area. The video below isn't that great visually, but it does a good job of capturing their pure sound on stage.  We only had general admission tickets but found a nice place to watch the show on a little hill just right of the stage. We enjoyed some Jeni's Ice Cream before the music started. The two opening bands, Oh Honey and Barcelona were decent.

Friday, July 25 - We loaded up in separate cars and headed north into Kentucky today and stayed in Louisville overnight as the start of a little fun (and a lotta work for Ashlee in Kentucky) and southern Ohio. I played some poker across the river from Louisville in Indiana while Ashlee worked.  Early in the evening we met up in the quaint old Louisville neighborhood of Clifton and had some delicious desserts at the Homemade Pie and Ice Cream Kitchen, then took a stroll that including passing the very interesting personal residence known as Jerry's Junk (photo above) and onto the relatively new Apocalypse Brewing Company for a couple of tasty craft beers.  It was certainly a lovely summer evening to be in "Loo'avull."

Saturday, July 26 - We got up this morning (had breakfast at Wild Eggs...of course) and headed further north to see the Washington Nationals play the hometown Cincinnati Reds at The Great American Ballpark.  It was our first time in the ballpark, and she is a beauty.  We had great seats hovering above the first base line in Section 301 which are shaded and attached to an all-you-can-eat suite that was phenomenal.  We got the most out of our money too with hot dogs, BBQ sandwiches and ice creams sandwiches before the game even started.  Then it was popcorn, another ice cream sandwich each, pizza, a soft pretzel, nachos and peanuts plus free soft drinks.  What a deal!  The game was an exciting, albeit low-scoring, defensive struggle with the Reds winning 1-0 and posting 11 strikeouts on the division-leading Nationals.  This looks to become a once-a-year tradition for us if possible.  We had such a great time including our leisurely walk across the Ohio River to the ballpark from Covington, KY where we parked for just a few bucks.

Sunday, July 27 - It was back south toward Louisville again today as we planned on heading to the Kentucky Speedway for an Indy Car Ride-Along.  It got rained out unfortunately. We are rescheduling it for next summer where we hope to do a duplicate trip.  We had more delicious pie at another location of the Homemade Pie and Ice Cream Kitchen and then went our separate ways as Ashlee had a couple more days work in Kentucky to complete, and I was due at work back home the next morning.  What a dandy little weekend it was despite the rain hiccup.

Thursday, July 31 - Tonight we attended the first of two SOLD OUT shows of The Bacon Brothers at The Franklin Theater.  Even more exciting to us was the chance meet and greet Michael and Kevin!   Thanks to our friend, Brenda, for grabbing the tickets for us while we were out of town and for going with us to the show.

The meet and greet was only a little more in price and included down-front seating for the show.  The Bacon Brothers couldn't have been nicer.  We got autographs, a group picture with them and even individual shots.  I have never gotten more "likes" on a Facebook post than I have of this picture of me and Kevin.  One degree feels pretty darn good!!

We had a delicious dinner beforehand at The Red Pony Restaurant across the street from the theater in downtown Franklin.   And, yes, one of the delicious (and our favorite) appetizers was THE BACON!!  Jason's Grilled Bacon to be exact.

Let's be honest here, we grabbed these tickets for a chance to meet Kevin-Freakin-Bacon and not really for the music.  But guess what?  These brothers can play some pretty good music!  Below is a true "boot-leg" clip (I shot it from around my bootleg since cameras weren't allowed during the show) that shows just how good the brothers and their stellar band are.  This is some of their closing encore cover of The Band's classic "Up on Cripple Creek."  It was a great show, and we would definitely see them again, meet-and-greet or not.  This was also our first time at the beautiful Franklin Theater which has been lovingly restored and has great acoustics and sight lines for music.  We are lucky to have it so nearby and hope to catch some more events here in the future.

seaBOURNE on the 4th of July

It was quick cruise for us over the 4th of July weekend with a couple of good friends and our first time out of the country on Independence Day.

Wednesday, July 2 - We drove south after work, picked up our friend, Mike, in Chattanooga, and got past Atlanta and spent the night in Macon, GA, about half-way to our final destination.  Thursday, July 3 - We boarded the Carnival Sensation cruise ship in Port Canaveral, Florida, around noon after meeting our friend, Wayne, who had flown down from Nashville to meet us.  We were also celebrating Wayne's recent birthday as well as the fact that this was his first cruise ever.

We departed at 4 PM from the Port Canaveral Port in good weather despite the presence of Tropical Storm Arthur that had blown through here earlier in the week.  Photo courtesy of Wayne's I-Phone.

Port Canaveral Beach was a pretty site on our way out to sea.

Friday, July 4 - Happy Independence Day! And hello Nassau!

Ashlee's been to Nassau a couple other times on some "girls-only cruises" but this was my first time here and our first time together.  It's quite beautiful  here, and the Atlantis Casino and Resort in the distance is massive in scale.

Ahoy, Nassau, Bahamas!.  It is us, the Americans!

Soon after docking, we made our way down the harbor, secured some beer and met Captain Danny and our private chartered boat for the four of us.  He whisked us away from the noise and crowds of the busy port and headed to a secluded island and private beach where we spent lots of time snorkeling, sunbathing and imbibing on a few delicious Kalik beers.

If you are going to spend the 4th of July out of the good ol' USA, it might as well be on a private beach!!

Goofing around in the ocean.  Photo courtesy of Wayne's amazing GoPro camera in it's waterproof case.

Small boat heading back to the big boats.  We had a great 4-hour excursion with Cpt. Danny that ended with us even taking turns tubing behind the boat. We sure wish we had more time to spend here. We finished our excursion day with a visit to Senor Frog's for a couple more libations and some browsing and shopping around the port.

Saturday, July 5 - It was a relaxing day at sea today as we headed back toward the Florida coast.

Big blue view aboard the Carnival Sensation.

The day aboard the ship was spent just lounging around soaking up some rays; sliding and splashing on the ships excellent water slides; sipping a few cocktails here and there; getting to some new friends we had made at dinner the two nights before and eating way, way too much (but the chicken fingers are sooooo good!)

Sunday, July 6 - We arrived back in port early this morning and began our long drive home without incident.  Another great little trip notched in our travel belts.