Friday, May 18th Franklin Park, Il. Railroad Daze Festival, and Saturday, May 19th Robinsonville, Ms. at “Gold Strike Casino.”

Hey everyone! Hope all is well out there! We’ve been busy around here, not only musically (business ect.), but with our lives at home as well. So thanks for bearing with us through our times of still trying to play “catch up” after being out for 5 weeks! I, personally, had taken it upon myself to totally strip and re-stain the deck at my house! I’m pleased to say that I FINALLY finished the damned thing and I’m still finding stain on parts of my body! Ha! Anyhow, as soon as it has finished drying, I want to have everyone over for a deck party. I have opened up a heck of a can of worms because now that the deck looks brand spankin’ new, the rest of the house could use a good renewal on the paint. As Homer Simpson would say “D’OH!!” Looks like I’ll be taking “Painting 101” for the rest of the season when I’m not out on the road.

Anyhow, we had an awesome weekend. We’d left Thursday night and we were happy to have our agent/manager Bob Kinkead out with us. We’re not sure if he’s going to come out with us again after the various forms of punishment we put him through. Hee hee! I’ll leave it up to Trenna to post the “proper forms of picture blackmail” as needed.
We were delighted to be back to perform at the Railroad Daze festival in Franklin Park, IL. The weather was absolutely perfect and it was nice to see everyone! Great to hang with you again Jeff! We missed you Jim Peterik! It was nice to see you again Mayor Dan, and we really do appreciate your work towards raising money for Multiple Sclerosis. During our show, Mayor Dan arranged to have donation cans passed through the audience to raise money for M.S. He’d kept in touch with Becky since our last show because they both have loved ones who have M.S. He gave her a bandanna with various names of people who have M.S. signed on it. She was extremely touched. Thank you again so much.
They treated us to Italian lunch at a local place called “Gino’s,” were we tried various pizzas, Chicken Parmesan, and lasagna. Thank you for making us feel at home and welcomed back.

The next day, we were off to Robinsonville, Ms. to play as show with T.G. Shepard at the Gold Strike Casino. We actually stopped off in Memphis on the way to check out the huge International Barbecue festival they were holding on the riverfront. We got to hang out and walk for a few hours. I couldn't resist but to take a stroll up the famous Beale Street and take in some of the bluesy vibe. We had to move on afterwards, but we did get to drive past Graceland on the way out.
We got to the Gold Strike Casino and they were very hospitable. They had a nice greenroom ready for us- full of snacks, coffee, tea etc. They’d also given us some rooms in which to clean up in. I must say that with a lot of casinos, it’s quite a trek getting back and forth from one place to the other. Debbie and I had taken a 15 minute stroll up to one room, only for poor Debbie to realize that’d she’d left something back on the bus! Poor girl! The show was being held in their theatre, which was absolutely amazing sounding! We especially noticed the wonderful acoustics of the theatre when we would perform our slower ballads. You could hear a pin drop in there!
We got the opportunity to meet Kimmy’s friends and folks. She’s from Memphis, so she had a lot of friends that came out to the show. We had a lot of fun throughout the show and afterwards we got to go hang out in the VIP lounge of the casino where they had drinks, snacks and cookies…, chocolate chip cookies.., yummy. I ate too many. We hung out, chilled, laughed a lot and turned some heads. We proceeded to pick on Bob, our poor manager and make his eve a living hell. Ha.., well, we all had fun! Thanks again T.G. and Gold Strike for having us!