Showdown at the Back Porch Door!

The famous “ Docklines …” opening:  “It’s been a while …,”  or, “I can’t believe it’s been so long since my last post.”  Take your pick; these lines seem to have become interchangeable for this journal in recent years.   I almost always have good reasons.  Never excuses, mind you, but reasons.  This time is no different.

Since my last post I have been very busy.  I lost one of my full-time employees, (my Assistant Dock Master joined the U.S. Coast Guard and gave his notice), and I hired a new hand and worked many overtime hours because I wanted to train this one myself.  I have also been attending concerts.  Yes, I said concerts, LOL.

The Savannah Music Festival kicked off on Thursday March 20th at the brand new Charles H. Morris Center with a concert by Brazilian Jazz musicians Daniel Santiago and Gabriel Grossi.  Santiago’s fluid fretwork on the guitar was matched by Grossi’s masterful technique on the chromatic harmonica.  It was a brilliant performance and, because it was the first concert ever at this new venue as well as the first event of the festival, it was heavily covered by the local media.  My picture was on the front page of the Savannah Morning News the next day as I was sitting front and center at the performance.  That’s me sitting there in the middle of the photo wearing the red and black jacket.

The next concert I attended was the following Wednesday night, also at the Charles H. Morris Center.  The first concert was by the blues trio of Eric Culbertson, followed by a concert by another blues trio fronted by Sean Costello.  Each artist was masterful in their own right, each with their different styles of the blues.  The blues doesn’t get any better than it did that night!

I was fortunate on Friday night to have the pleasure of seeing Bruce Hornsby and Ricky Skaggs in concert.  These two recorded an album together a while back and have performed together many times since the release of the CD.  I thought it was an unusual pairing, but was not prepared for the shear mastery and perfect blending of these two talents.  Ricky had his Kentucky Thunder Band on stage with him and Bruce Hornsby’s piano was another addition to the band for the evening.  They played some of Bruce’s hits and some of Ricky’s hits and some hits they did together.  Then Ricky did some of Bruce’s songs and Bruce sang some of Ricky’s songs.  The way these two voices blended you would have thought they were brothers.

Tomorrow night after work, I get to see The Derek Trucks Band.  Derek is one of today’s foremost guitar players and just got back from his tour with Eric Clapton.  He is also married to Blues guitar artist and star, Susan Tedeshi.  It promises to be one heck of a concert.  Thursday night I will see a performance by slide guitarists from around the world.  Derek Trucks will be one of the four performing artists in that show; he is one of the most respected slide guitarists in our nation.

So, there you have it.  The stress of losing an employee, the hiring and training of a new one, the burning the candle at both ends by indulging my passion for music at night, and reporting to a regular job by day.   Oh, and add to that the fact I had to go in on my day off yesterday due to the fact that it was the last day of the month and I had to do the month end inventory for the Ship’s Store and the monthly walk-through of my wet and dry boat storage areas.

When I got home from work yesterday, I was in my bedroom changing back into shorts and tee shirt to kick around the house in and I noticed some activity out on the porch.  I did a double take when I peeked out there.  There was a full grown peacock staring at little Miss Emmie through the glass door on the other end of the porch.  I quickly made my way out there with camera in hand.  The peacock, a female, was not fazed by my presence and continued to examine Emmie as though she might be a future meal, LOL.

Emmie held her ground and did some championship staring right back:

I went into the kitchen to get a shot of the bird from a different angle and was able to catch a shot of the only time the peacock spread her tail feathers:

After a while, the peacock wandered around the yard a bit and then just moseyed on off:

In what spare time I have had, I have also been practicing my guitar and trying to do the extra credit Photo Challenge presented by Marie last month.  The challenge was to do a photo project that you had never tried before and, after learning how to do it, present a tutorial on what you started with, what you ended up with, and what you did to get that result.  I have finished my project, now I just have to figure out how to present the tutorial.  I’ll get back to Ya’ll on that one.

I’m sorry I have not been around to read journal these past two weeks, but my whole sleep schedule has been thrown off and I find myself over sleeping in the mornings and I have not been home a lot at night.  I usually don’t get out much, so these night time forays are taking their toll on me.  I hope to get back to normal by the end of this week.  Until next time, take care!

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