Irish Fest was a good time. The Elders were excellent! I will definitely have to try and see them again. A rockin’ Irish band, arse kickin’ as they say!

Sunday we lounged around for awhile and then had some mexican food at Ponaks. Doni & Phil invited us over for a cookout, etc. After some more lounging we went over there and sat outside until the sky unloaded on us unexpectedly. Still a good time despite the weather. From there we went over to Fred P Ott’s on the plaza for some cheap beers. We played pinball, megatouch, etc. and left soon after some loud band started playing. That place is too small to have full bands, at least I think so…

Yesterday we took Amy to the airport, then ended up playing 9 holes of golf. Both Kim and I improved from our scores from the last time we played. I even got my first career birdie (well not counting the first “drive” that I sent flying into the woods). It was on the last hole of the course, a pretty long par 4 actually. I had given up on using my 3 wood earlier in the day, and for the at least half of the holes I was driving with my 3 iron. I was actually hitting it really well. I think I must have lined up bad on my first attempt on this hole, so I did end up hitting it straight into the woods. I then hit another one pretty far and right down the fairway. My second shot I hit a 9 iron which struck the green within a few feet of the hole and rolled to maybe 10 feet away. I sank that putt for my birdie! I kind of liked playing yesterday, well at least the second half. My problem now is starting off the hole. I often hit 2, 3, maybe even 4 or 5 balls before I get one to land in a spot that is playable for my second shot. I think I need to hit up the driving range again soon.

Today I’m back at work, but at least it’s Tuesday already!

This was a pretty boring week if you couldn’t already tell. It did go by super fast though with the office move and such. I like the new place more and more, and I think it’s a quicker drive for me now…

Kim’s college roommate (Amy) is here visiting for the weekend. She got in on Thursday night, so of course the girls wanted to go out that night. We ended up just going down to Tomfooleries for a few drinks and some decent cover band music. Last night we went down to see The Samples play. Todd came along with us, and we stuck around for a little while then ended up back at our apartment to play some euchre and darts. Todd and most other Missourians have no idea what euchre is, so we had to teach him the game, which he actually picked up on really quickly. If you are reading this and have never played the card game euchre, do yourself a favor and look it up online and then find 3 friends to play it with. Good times!

Have you ever held $1000 cash in your hands before? I actually did this last night. I went to the ATM before heading downtown for the concert. I accidentally hit an extra zero when pulling out some money. I thought there were usually limits on this kind of thing, but apparently not for this machine. It ended up spitting out 50 $20 bills. I couldn’t believe it. This bank wasn’t really in the best of areas either, so I quickly grabbed a deposit envelope and headed to the car, locked the doors, and prepared the envelope for a $900 deposit. Luckily I got it all back in the ATM safely. Good thing this was Kim’s account and not mine. :) We often wondered why this particular ATM was always out of cash, I guess we know now…

Tonight we are going to grill out some prime meats and then head down to the Irish Fest that is going on. Should be another great night!

Have a good and safe holiday weekend everyone!!!

So after work Friday I went home and Kim and I had some dinner and headed to the airport. Got to Baltimore just past 11 and met up with my buddy Weeba. We took a cab to the downtown area to meet up with everyone. We went to a couple different bars on Federal Hill, ropewalk and mothers. A good night out on the town. An old friend of mine (EJ) was out with us, so it was fun to party with him. Tracey must have said “best birthday ever!” 4 million times, and we all did have a great time.
Saturday we got up and ate at Chipotle! Then headed to DC to checkin to the hotel there. We sat around for a few hours, when we should have been going out to a few museums or something, but I think we were all tired and lazy. The show that night was awesome, we owned the entire top balcony/bar area. Our buddy Rob and his wife Ilona came out to the show. Felt like I hadn’t seen him in years. We ended up going to Ben’s Chili Bowl after the show was over and then closed the basement bar. The guy taking orders could not get the fact that I wanted a chili dog without the dog, too funny. It’s no Skyline, but it wasn’t too bad. :)
Another good weekend out with some great friends!

Last night we just sat around and watched the Olympics for the most part. US is doing pretty good over there, both the male and female individual all around golds in gymnastics. Team gold for female and team silver for male. Not to mention the swimmers. Definitely a ton to watch…

I’m not sure how I could forget to post this, but I’m heading to Baltimore and DC this weekend. It’s my good friend Tracey’s birthday today, and she decided she was heading out that way. It took some convincing for me to decide to go, but after awhile there were too many of my friends going not to go. Good thing I have a free southwest flight, that I am using. We are going to go out in Baltimore tonight, and then head to the 9:30 Club to see The Low Life. Should be a great weekend!

The DMB show was awesome! It was like going to a show in the summer of 2002 before Everyday was released, with a few brand new songs added in (which are really growing on me). There was only one song from the Everyday CD which made me very happy. Under The Table And Dreaming was the most played CD, and that almost always makes for a good show. During Nancies Dave tried to alter the line “Lost somewhere in Paris” and said “Lost somewhere in… Texas” Haha, the Texas shows are the next shows of the tour, what a fool. Sandstone is nice place to see a show if it’s a nice night out. I would hate to be there in the rain since there isn’t a roof over anything. The worst part of the place, the parking and traffic. We sat in the same spot for about an hour not moving until we finally gave up and turned around to try a different way out and got out in a matter of minutes. Don’t you think they could have people there to direct the cars???

Ahhhh… what happened? I almost got back into my old routine of updating this thing weekly, which is now Phil Kenagy style. :b

We hit up O’Dowd’s on the plaza on Wednesday night after my hockey. Kim’s new friend Amanda met up with us there, as did Mike. I had a couple Guinness, yum!

Friday night was the acoustic planet tour show at City Market with Bela Fleck, Keller Williams and Yonder Mt. What a show that was! The whole thing was seamless, meaning there were no set breaks between the different acts. Yonder Mt. played first and all of the Flecktones made an appearance during their set. Eventually Keller joined them onstage and they slowly left the stage. The same thing happened with Keller and Bela. The encore had all 9 performers on stage jamming away. I recorded the show, but I have no idea on setlists or how to cut it up, but look for it eventually. It was also the KC microbrew festival, so we had good beer all night long!

Saturday Kim and I headed to Wichita for my buddy Steve Christy’s birthday celebration featuring Shaking Tree. We booked the downtown Hyatt for $45 via priceline. The venue was awesome. It was an open air place with bug brick walls surrounding an open courtyard. Shaking Tree sounded the best I have heard them yet! A very good time for our first time in Wichita.

Last night we tried for 2nd row DMB tickets for tonight, but didn’t have the best of luck. At least we still have tickets for the show. The weather should be perfect for tonight. Oh yeah, the band is all staying right down the street from our place. As we drove in from Wichita yesterday I saw lines of buses sitting outside the Fairmont. I’m pumped for tonight!!!

I also might be getting reimbursed for my camera by the Cleveland Hyatt. It seems as if the head housekeeper is accepting blame for it being missing. It sounds too good to be true, but I’ll keep you updated on that…

Back to work…

Sorry about not posting yesterday, but I was super busy yesterday with work and catching up on all my usual internet activities. Well obviously FBTE was a great time. It is so hard to sum up such a wonderful time, so I won’t even try. I never want these weekends to end though, too much fun with such a large group of great friends. Not much else you can really ask for. Now the long wait until this years Hammerstein shows begins. Hopefully all of us can make it to NYC once again, for some more great times and memories!
The only bad thing about the weekend was the loss of my digital camera. I’m not sure if someone took it, if it’s still hidden under a bed somewhere or what, but hopefully it turns up. If you see anything strange on ebay let me know. I rarely lose anything, but I guess when I do it is usually something pretty important or of a pretty good value. Oh well, not much I can do now except for keep bugging the hotel…

So tonight I went to the String Cheese Incident for free thanks to The Planet. Obviously I was headed to the show by myself, but I had two tickets. I attempted to get some beer money for the show, but all of the people standing around outside looking for tickets didn’t have any money. I decided to just give the ticket to this one guy, who then proceeded to give me a hug. Aren’t hippies great? :) So I headed inside to see a nice taping section setup right behind the soundboard. The security had given all tapers the 2 rows immediately behind the board. The past two shows I have been to at the Uptown have had something like this, the other show was of course moe. I think that all bands should have a designated taper area, even if it is just a couple of those portable cages. It makes everything so much easier. The show was great, those guys really can jam, and their production isn’t too bad either. Legendary blues guitarist Taj Mahal (link has sound, beware!) was in town for his own show, and I guess he came over to the Uptown after his show. SCI and Taj Mahal came out for a second encore to play a tune. How cool is that? I’m glad I went…

Tomorrow afternoon I’m headed to Cleveland for this years Feelin’ Better Than Everfine Festival. I’m sure this is gonna be a great time. Updates when I return…

I almost forgot to update this today…
So I left work around 5 last night and headed towards downtown. I tried to meet up with Jerry and whoever else, but couldn’t get ahold of him, so I went to a pizza place for some food and a couple beers. A friend of mine named Dawn from out here in KC who goes to a ton of shows met up with me, and we went into the show shortly after doors opened. I got all of my gear setup, and talked to most of the guys in OAR and the crew. Nathanson started about 8, and played a rocking set full band style. He used to play with just him and Matt Fish on cello, but has since added a band. I wasn’t sure what I would think, but I loved it. I think the band adds to his sound, just as Marc Broussards band does. Howie Day played after Matt and bored me to sleep almost. I don’t mind him in small doses, but the hour long set about did it for me. And of course OAR played an excellent set after Howie. I got to hear two songs I’ve never seen live and a few other tunes that are pretty rare, so that is always nice. The lights are amazing this tour. Wow. I took some pictures, but I’m not sure they all will turn out very well. A good night out on the town…

I’m not sure what I’m gonna do tonight. There is another OAR show in Omaha, which is 2.5 hours away (doesn’t seem very likely), there is a John Mayer and Maroon 5 show at Sandstone that I would go to for free, or I could hang out with Phil and Todd at the Brooksider or something. We’ll see what happens…

Friday I met up with Kim along with Doni & Phil at a wine tasting at a store just down the road from their house. Fortunately for me, it was more of a beer tasting, with just a couple bottles of wine. One that I remember trying and buying was Kelpie Seaweed Ale, which is actually much better than it sounds. We also bought some Russian beers and even one from St. Louis. The names of all of the others are escaping me right now. We took our purchases over to Doni & Phil’s and yes they were drinking too. :)

Saturday was a rainy day, all it did was rain. Kim and I took care of some errands and even found time to see Fahrenheit 9/11. Very interesting movie, although most people probably already know that. Kim and I are a little slow in getting to the movies. I’m convinced that Michael Moore can prove any point he wants to, he is a pretty good film maker. I’ll just leave it at that, I’m not very political, and I don’t really know enough about all of this stuff…

Sunday was the usual day as always. We did get a game of golf in though. We had to play the par 3 since the water on the regular course was too high. Kim and I both got 44’s, which is only 17 over par. I think we are getting better maybe, haha.

Tonight is the night, OAR in KC. Should be a great night!