2003-03-24 - 8:28 p.m.
This is the beginning of the Road Journal.
March 12 - 13
Left late as usual. After an aborted attempt at getting a notary to witness our insurance waiver (long story), Andy, Todd and I headed off in the direction of Asheville, NC for our performance at Stella Blue.
As we approached Shippensburg, PA, Andy noticed a billboard boasting the worlds largest “used and rare” book store.The car was full of book hounds and the temptation was too great. We had to stop. Well I doubt it was the biggest “used and rare” bookstore but it was pretty big. Todd found some great stuff, including Lomax’s “Folk Songs of North America”. Andy found a book on Tibetan wisdom and I bought a copy of Earl Palmer’s auto biography. Earl Palmer was the great New Orleans drummer who you’ve heard on a hundred songs but didn’t know it.
Talked politics with an older women in a coffee shop across from the bookstore. It seems everyone I speak to is against going to war with Iraq.
Southern Pennsylvania; the cusp of the south. The civil war was basically won here. Either the Union line held or Lee’s army would be within striking distance of Washington.
Stopped outside of Roanoke for dinner. We wanted to make fancy gap before our day was through. We listened to a great bluegrass show out of Galax, VA called “Blue ridge Backroads”. It’s great to be back in the south!
Another Day’s Inn night then up in the morning and on to Asheville. We had been invited to do a live radio broadcast on WNCW in Spindale, NC. WNCW is a great station kind of in the mold of WFUV or KPIG.We were engineered by Dennis ‘the nail” Jones. He was a jolly sort and a fine time was had by all! We played 4 tunes and chatted a bit with the DJ.
A warm, light rain fell as we loaded into the club in Asheville. After we got stuff in we split up for dinner. I wandered a bit and found a Middle Eastern restaurant with a belly dancer. The dancing was good. The food was mediocre. Asheville is a neat college town with all the college town stuff like cool restraints and of course bookstores.
The crowd was light but they were way into it. Our friends Frank and Dougaroo were in attendance. The show went well and the barkeep bought me a few too many rounds of Irish whiskey, especially since Dougaroo was taking me and Todd and Mike to the ACC basketball tournament in Greensboro early the next morning.
