I was just looking at my last blog entry and I see I haven't written anything since about Christmas time and here it is six months later already. My faithful readers (all two of them) probably think I have fallen off the face of the earth. I'll quickly update you on what I've been up to lately and then let you get back to your regularly scheduled lives. Since March I've been working at a place in Menasha called SCA tissue as a staff accountant. It's a pretty nice job where I get to do a lot of cool stuff with Excel. Probably something only an accountant would find exciting but fun none the less.

When I'm not working I play music every chance I get in between the household chores and yardwork which always seem to get in the way. During the winter I went to a festival called Swamp N Grass in Elkhart Lake, WI. I played at Memorial Gardens in Appleton for a spring festival in May with my friends Hugo, Julie and Dick. Once a week we jam at Liz's or Tom's and just recently we've started a bi-monthly Green Apple jam at Generation's coffeehouse in Neenah. I went to the Bill Jorgenson Memorial festival in June and did some late night jamming until five in the morning. I hope to make it to a couple of more festivals this summer. I probably won't make it to Evart again this year as work will probably get in the way. But I look forward to seeing my Michigan friends at Al & Millie's Labor Day weekend jam. I've also made it to a couple of the Fondy Acoustic Music Association jams this year in Fond Du Lac. The picture above is from the Green Apple pick-nic we recently had at Peabody park in Appleton.

In other news I have a friend who is trying to convince me I need a woman in my life. She's tried to get me to use the online dating sites etc but I've only tentatively tried them. At this point in my life I've kind of decided that maybe I'll be perpetually single but I guess you never know.

Anyway, I hope your summer is off to a good start and I'll try to write again before another six months go by.

Well here it is a couple of days after Christmas 2006. I found myself tonight reflecting back on this year's celebration and also thinking about some Christmas's past. It was great as always spending time with my mom, sisters, brother-in-laws and their children. Maybe I shouldn't call them children as my oldest nephew is going to graduate from college this spring. Man am I getting old! Anyway we had our traditional Christmas Eve dinner at my Mom's house after going to mass at St. Mary's church in Menasha. St. Mary's was beautifully decorated and they had some great music with acoustic guitars and a choir. Whenever I go to St. Mary's I can't help but think of my dad as he was an usher there for years and also went to school there when he was growing up. I went there myself from first to third grade so that brings back a lot of memories too. The picture above is of my dad and his sister Annette. My dad also had two twin sisters Ruth and Rhoda.

When I was growing up we would always gather at my Dad's parent's house on Christmas Eve. It was usually our family, my Aunt Rhoda's family and my grandparents. My Aunts Annette and Ruth both lived out of state so most years weren't able to make it back home. My Grandma would cook the most delicious Christmas Eve dinner. After dinner the kids would wait patiently until the dishes were cleaned up. Presents were then opened and Grandpa would capture all the festivities on this old 16mm movie camera he had. The interesting thing about this camera was he had this light bar which was about the equivalent of about 16 suns shining directly into your eye. The films have survived though and make for some great watching. I think we have every Christmas from about the early 60's through the late seventies captured on film. As we were opening the presents the kids would look eagerly out the window to try to catch of glimpse of Santa's sleigh. Later in the evening we would head home and miraculously Santa would have come while we were at Grandma and Grandpa's house.

The thing I miss most about those Christmases is we aren't able to celebrate Christmas any longer with some of those same people. Our family went through kind of a tragic time in the early 1990's with a lot of deaths in a short amount of time. My Grandma died in April 1991, my Dad in May 1991, and Rhoda and her husband Roy were killed in a a car accident in March of 1992 and then by September 1993 my Grandpa was also gone. So I guess in a way I have a little bit of the Christmas blues tonight. I miss being able to celebrate Christmas with my Dad, Aunt Rhoda and Uncle Roy and my grandparents.

On New Year's Day we're getting together with my cousins Sue, Dawn, and Karen who are Rhoda and Roy's children. They remind me so much of their Mom and Dad. It's nice to see Rhoda and Roy reflected in their children. Some people say the same about me - that I remind them of my Dad. It always makes me proud when someone says that.

Anyway thanks for indulging my Christmas blues. Maybe I'll go and watch some of my Grandpa's old Christmas home movies and relive some of those Christmases of old and be reminded once again how fortunate I am to have grown up in such a loving family.

I hesitate to write this because my acoustic friends are going to find out what I've been up to.  But I'll bite the bullet and come clean at the risk of alienating all of my acoustic friends.  As some of you know I've been frequenting  this local coffee shop.  I was first introduced to this place when a bluegrass group I was involved with did a show there.  Long story short the owner was less than pleased with our group's performance and booted us off the schedule.  But ironically he thought I showed some promise and asked me if I'd be interested in trying out some rockabilly stuff.  I had no idea what rockabilly was so I went home and did a google search and found out this definition on wikipedia:  Rockabilly is one of the earliest forms of rock and roll as a distinct style of music. It is a fusion of blues, hillbilly boogie, bluegrass music and country music, and its origins lie in the American South. 

I was pleased to see bluegrass music mentioned in the definition so maybe I wouldn't be too far out of my element if I gave this a try.   I have this mental image now of all my acoustic friends running away shreiking in horror that I have abandoned traditional music and jumped on the rock and roll bandwagon.  Kind of like when Bob Dylan went electric and alienated half of his fan base.   So anyway we formed this little rockabilly band with the owner of the coffee shop on guitar and a couple of younger guys - one on bass and one on guitar and I was elected the lead singer.  We have opened up a couple of times for various musical acts that have come through the coffee shop.  But I must admit we have never sounded very polished and a few times I have noticed the real musicians and a few customers exiting the shop while we played.  Not too good for a confidence builder!  Part of our problem is lack of practice and part of the problem is trying to combine people with very diverse musical backgrounds.

So to jump forward to tonight.  The owner of the shop has a good friend who is in a heavy metal band called Psycho Scream.  So we were the opening act.  Kind of like showing Mary Poppins at a movie theater as the opening feature before Friday the 13.  Actually the Psycho Scream guys are pretty decent folks and the drummer was nice enough to sit in during our set and help us out.    They are all actually pretty nice guys so I don't want to disparage their group in any way.  My only real problem with the whole night was the volume.  They had enough sound equipment to play a small arena.  I don't understand why music has to be played that loud to be good.  The volume just kind of ruins it for me.  I had to sneak outside several times to give my eardrums a break!

My biggest challenge is to convince my electric playing friends to play at a more reasonable volume.  One thing nice about playing with acoustic players is they understand dynamics and are kind of good at achieving a good balance between the voices and the instruments.  It's more of a challenge with my electric playing friends.  But it's not all bad.  We actually sounded ok tonight on a couple of the songs.

So there you have it.  I have come clean about my forays into the rock and roll world.  The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem.  I admit it.  Some of the rockabilly stuff is actually fun to play.  Isn't it every kids dream to front a rock and roll band?  Although I think I'm about 20 years plus too late.  So to my acoustic friends please don't hate me.  I hope I'm still welcome at your jams.  Just so you know every time we have done the rockabilly stuff I have proudly played my acoustic guitar.  They have tried to tempt me with the electric guitar but so far I have been strong enough to refuse.  Plus I think I just look dumb holding one.  I also promise not to start wearing spandex and growing my hair down to my ankles.

I know it's only rock and roll but I like it, like it yes I do!  Err I mean Bury me beneath the willow, under the weeping willow tree...Somebody help me, I'm so confused!