Nashville - The Iconic Recession Lunch

After the riverboat, I headed to an iconic Honky Tonk.  As one does.

Robert's Western World.

 

The place was jam-packed, standing room only, and barely enough room to stand. 

After a while, manged to get a seat at the bar. The bar tenders never stopped working for an instant, but they were attentive and friendly the entire time which was cool.

Great music,  a fun atmosphere, and it was time to order lunch. 

Probably the cheapest lunch on Broadway:

Yep, I ordered the famous Recession Special.

It arrived reasonably quickly as the cook was also jammed up with people ordering the special, among other dishes.

 

It's the iconic order there. 

But, the fried baloney served with lettuce and tomato was tasty, filling, and the included PBR worked with it,  as did the chips and Moon Pie for dessert. It was the cheapest lunch I've had out just about anywhere.

Stayed for some tunes and then decided to do a bit of a bar crawl.

Next stop was Tootsies Orchid Lounge, back in the day, prior to 1979, the hang out for the Opry performers as the Ryman Auditorium where the Opry had been located, was next door. 

A solid live band was performing:

 

Had a local brew, Hap and Harry's Lager, which was ok, and listened to some tunes. 

Then headed off to do some more wandering around. 

Nashville - To The Opry!

I spent this weekend in Nashville,  taking some time to enjoy the city.

Arrived there on Saturday after a pleasant flight and checked into the hotel.

I then walked from the hotel to the WeGo bus station which was about a 20 minute walk along Broadway and Rep John Lewis Way. It was sunny and hot in the low 90s.

On my walk, I passed by quite a few homeless people and meth-heads, of which there was a strong overlap.

One in particular was busy loudly arguing with himself most vociferously, and a but further on a meth lady was getting in another homeless person's face and barking like a dog at him which was interesting to watch as I strolled on by.  I decided not to remain around and see the entire interaction play out, as it was the very definition of "Not my circus, not my monkeys", leaving plenty of space between me and the meth-heads.

Got to the bus station and then hopped on the #34 bus to Opry Mills.  Pretty easy system to figure out and the bus ride was pleasant with few people on the bus.

Got off at the last stop at  Opry Mills.

Since this was the south, I had a meal at Mission BBQ, which was very good, with great friendly service and a nice atmosphere.  I made short work of the Brisket platter which was excellent.

Then it was off to the Opry.

Getting there was a tad complicated as the easy walkway from the Opry Mills Mall to the Opry was closed for some reason, necessitating a wide detour around a pretty trafficy road on foot without much room  for pedestrians.  But, I made it.

 

The Opry is a live radio show that has been running since the 1920s.

Went in and got seated for the show. 

The show is broadcast live on air and the announcer would announce the performers and also read out advertisements from sponsors in between performances in a most warm and welcoming voice.

Before the show officially starts, the announcer gave a nice audio/visual show giving the history of the Opry which was a nice introduction.

The On Air signs lit up and the show began. 

 We got to listen to some great performers:

It opened with Mark Wills:

Stefanie Quayle, who sang a Dolly Parton song -- and absolutely nailed it. Dolly had encouraged her to keep on singing early in her career and this was a wonderful tribute.

Medium Build did his debut at the Opry and you could tell he was all sorts of excited to do so, and he really gave a performance.

Charles Esten, who first performed solo and then in a duet for Islands In The Stream in honor of Dolly.

 Note he's not using a strap to hold the guitar in place.  He didn't use one the entire time he was on stage which was impressive.

Keith And Kristen Getty along with two of their daughters, for the daughters' first time on stage at the Opry and they did great. 

 

Tommy Emanuel, who dazzled  everyone with his amazing guitar playing.

 

John Conlee, who did a very meaningful and emotional rendition of A Lot of Things Different that brought down the house:

The Oak Ridge Boys who sang Elvira, with one of them sporting the most epic beard to grace the stage closed out the show

It was a great performance.

After the show, I went to the Opry gift shop, and then after having some after show beverages decided to take an Uber back to the hotel as walking late at night back through the meth-elated area didn't seem like the wisest decision.

It was a great first day in Nashville.  If you happen to be in Nashville and the Opry has a performance, be sure to go to it, it is really worth it.

Enhanced In Translation: "Your brain increases its wisdom, but your heart increases its stupidity."

Why not take Smash Mouth's All Star, translate it into Aramaic, and then translate it back?

Isaac Mayer did so, and the result is pretty awesome.

Newshub: Smash Mouth's 'All Star' translated to Aramaic and back becomes 'beautiful poetry'

Yes, yes it does:

There was one who said unto me that the universe was going to cause me to tremble,

That I am not the sharpest cutting implement in the storehouse.

She had the appearance unto me as a stupid one,

With her finger and her thumb

In the frame of a Greek gamma upon her forehead.

It's worth clicking the link and going and RTWT, and I think Smash Mouth could give this version a whirl.

Israel Day 5 - Tel Aviv And A Rock Concert

We headed north to Tel Aviv.

We got dropped off, rested a bit, and then headed out on our own.

Then we grabbed a cab and headed to Yarkon Park.

Yarkon park is huge, and we got dropped off near where we were going, but it was still quite a walk in for the concert.

Ahead of the trip we had found out that Bon Jovi would be in town, the timing worked, so we got tickets to the show. So we carefully prepared by playing some classic Bon Jovi for the kids before the trip, and they decided they liked it.

Yes, Bon Jovi is still around and singing.

The concert was standing room only, no seats, on the grass, with 50,000 Israelis and at least 4 Americans attending.

It seems it was about the end of Bon Jovi's European tour and unfortunately the sound system quality wasn't great and they seemed a bit tired but they still put on a good show.

It was a cool experience to hear 50,000 Israelis belting out the lyrics to It's My Life, Living on a Prayer, You Give Love A Bad Name, and other classic Bon Jovi tunes, and to raucously sing along with them.

It was a lot of fun and a neat experience.

After the concert we headed back to where we were staying and fell asleep quickly after a very long and full day.

Not bad for our last rock concert of the decade.

An Engaging New Music Style - Meaningwave Lo Fi

There's an interesting new music style out there.

Called Meaningwave, created by Akira The Don, it sets lectures.speeches of some interesting people to lo-fi music, revising them into songs while making their meanings come across very easily.

In short, its a rather entertaining and easy way of listening to the highlights of the thoughts and words of some very smart people. Sort of a Coles Notes edition set to music.

He has quite a few of Jordan Peterson, including a very humorous cut of his thoughts on alcohol, or his now famous rules for life. Everyone can take some element of what Peterson's saying and apply it to make your own life better. While reading the 12 Rules Book is highly recommended, this isn't a bad way to get some listening time in when you're in the car.

Then, if you need a boost in the morning, well, if you can't get motivated by listening to his version of Jocko Willink's stuff on the way to work, you may very well have no pulse.

105.1 calls Christmas way early

Magic 105.1 has a nasty habit of celebrating the holiday season by switching over to solely Christmas music all day, all the time, 24 hours a day.

They then cutely call themselves Christmas 105.1.

This year they switched over on Halloween.

While I have nothing against Christmas music per se, its a tad bit early.

I mean, its not even Thanksgiving yet! We're still in the autumn season. There's still a multitude of shopping days left!

Not a speck of snow is upon the ground, I don't want to think about the impending snow setting upon the ground, and now some singer is gleefully crooning about a white Christmas all day long.

While 105.1 normally has a pretty good song lineup, I now have to skip past it on the radio buttons for the next few months.

Look 105.1, playing only Christmas music straight through for the next two months is a tad bit too much. In addition, would it kill you to play the Hanukkah song once in the lineup?

Green Day Singer Tossed Off Plane For Wearing Sagging Pants

Foxnews:Green Day Front Man Kicked Off Plane Because of Saggy Pants

Apparently airlines these days are very concerned that their passengers wear pants that aren't properly worn.

Billie Joe Armstrong might also have been kicked off because he was an American Idiot on Holiday.

Now pull up your pants.

On Sunday, a Match with a Forest of Steel, followed by listening to a live Barrage

Yesterday I participated in another USPSA match and had a great time.

The first stage I encountered was a veritable forest of steel - 18 plates and 6 Poppers for a total of 24. There were three shooting boxes and you could only hit the white targets from the white box, the orange from the orange which had a barrier between you and the targets forcing you to lean left and right to hit them, and the blue from the blue box, but only by shooting through the hole in the barrel.

A fun stage and unlike the Glock match, I left no plate standing.

Other stages wre also fun and challenging and we ended with an El Presidente drill.

Great fun, but I still had the same problem with the M&P, just less frequently.

After about 60 shots I got a light primer strike along with a click, which sucked.

Taking the gun apart, wiping down the inside of the slide near the striker helped. On putting it back together it would, while dry firing, have the same feel of the striker not hitting, and you could see the slide move rearward rather than remaining locked. I'm not happy about this recurring problem as its a great gun to shoot and fits me well, but if it can't be reliable...

After the match I came home and took the family to see Barrage at Meadowbrook Music Theater.

Barrage is a impressive group of 6 fiddle players, a guitarist, drummer and bassist. Not only do they have a thorough selection of instrumental music they also sing and dance as well.

Their talented range is truly eclectic - from Irish fiddling to blue grass to flamenco to the Beatles, Cold Play and more and they make it all sound awesome.





The kids loved it and now want to take violin lessons (I'll be sending Barrage the bill for it...). Leah is also quite convinced that the violin player that had a flower in her hair likes her and wants to be her friend as she kept smiling at Leah.

The band had a lot of energy and talent to spare and they can make those violins sing. I'm not sure if the match or the concert was louder at times.

Barrage gave it their all and did not one, but two encores after a unanimous standing ovation from the crowd.

If Barrage comes to a town and has a show near you and you like live music played and played well it's quite the show to see and hear.