Road report:
This one is a little different. Banged my pinky finger pretty good a few days before I left. Didn't touch my horn so I could let it recover. First gig was 8 hours at the Jacksonville airport. Suffice to say I was playing through the pain. Next two days were airport gigs and night gigs. Finger hurts. A lot.
Gigs were pretty cool. Bumped into folk musician Jim Scott in the airport. We had a nice chat, we jammed on a tune and off he went to his gig in Tallahassee. Fun stuff. I also put my gigs online via an online busking site. That was kind of fun and made the time between flights a lot of fun to play. Had some pretty good traffic from that and even made some tips. All in all, the first leg was pretty. Got to hang out with my brother and his family a little bit. That's always nice, but the gigs were so long it was out the door at 7am and home after midnight and then time to hit the road.
Couple of notable things.
Jazzland in Jacksonville. the outside is deceiving. The inside is a straight-up jazz club. Nice little bar, cool tables, tight stage, house PA and jazz lovers and fans. Unfortunately, it was cold and rainy. And it's Florida, streets were empty and the club had a small crowd. But it was fun and the attendees were cool. One of them even posted a couple cell phone videos on facebook.
Dandelion Cafe in Orlando. Once again a great show and good food. Even though it's tiny, I always have a great a show there. People are cool and they are practically in your lap. I was pretty hot that night although the cramped space made for some foot blunders on the pedals. It happens.
Spent the night at a service station on the Turnpike and got online to do some work for the first time in three days. Can't really deal with loopfest biz right now...that's kind of not cool. Too much to do. Got a great gig tonight and then Monday is off. Looking forward to some serious online work and I'm thinking some beach time. Haven't had a REAL day off since I don't know when. I'll hook up with Zack on Tuesday after my gig and we'll get to work on the new project. Looking forward to getting musically dirty with him!
Feeling pretty good. My cheeks hurt from the stool at the airport. 22 hours of playing in three days is a butt-buster. Plus driving, plus other gigs...oww. Pinkie hurts too, swelling is gone down but I think it's broken. Hand hurts from favoring it and holding the horn though. My thumb callous from the horn is getting larger too. I have a knobby thumb. Back is little better. My brother is a N.P. for the Navy and an acupuncturist. He gave me a treatment. That helped, although it was a little disturbing on how taken he was with how messed up it is. He kept saying it's worse than his patient with fibromyalgia. And hear I thought things were really getting better. That being said, i am feeling pretty good. Eating smart, finally got some sleep, playing a ton of music, talking with the wife on the phone when we both have a few moments. Good times for sure. I do love being on tour. I really do.