Keb Mo at the Wilbur Theater in Boston

Last night my son Matt and I went to the Wilbur Theater in Boston to see three-time Grammy award winner Keb Mo perform with his band. What a treat - if you get the chance to see this artist, jump at it! My oldest son Fred is housemates with Keb's stage manager in Nashville, so a big thank you to both Fred and Ryan for the amazing seats and the chance to chat with Keb Mo afterwards.

It is interesting to see an artist that you know nothing about. We went in with clean slates for brains - we had youtube-d a few of Keb's songs, and I especially like his version of Johnny Cash's Folsom Prison Blues (at dinner the night before Ryan told us he was not performing this on the current tour - bummer!) But other than our youtube exposure, I didn't know anything about this talented man.

Keb is very tall and slim, and is visually magnetic - his large feet tapping out rhythms, his long arms cradling his guitar, his smile radiant, capturing every person in the room with his enthusiasm and organic love of performing. He is jazzed by playing live, and so are his players - keyboards, bass and drummer often grinned at each other, at the crowd, as well as at a young guitar student from Cape Cod that was the band's special guest for the show. The set list was a blend of ballad, funk and blues, the lyrics simple and moving or funny, or wry. (My favorite - a song called Government Cheese.) Keb's showmanship extends to chatting easily to his rapt audience, and he stopped to take pen and paper and create a list of the songs audience members were shouting out as requests in a very funny interlude on stage,

Thank you Keb for a amazing live show - Matt and I are new and passionate Keb Mo fans. :-)

Government cheese on youtube : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ddWAiHCoEc

Mom, I'm itchy...

A Quick Nine Holes, Anyone?

I have just started golfing. Well...almost golfing - they don't actually set you loose on the course until you "are not a danger to yourself or others,"  whatever that means. Apparently you have to hit 1,000,000 drives off the tee before you are deemed course-worthy,

My husband Fred is a big golfer. He loves/hates the game, depending on the day. He attended the Masters this year, and was just totally amazed by the whole experience. I was so happy he got a chance to be there to see Tiger Woods throw up his hands in total frustration.

My husband has tried to teach me to golf several times. He is exceedingly patient and I'm happy that he wants me to golf with him, but acting out his list of demands in one fluid motion was challenging: keep your elbow straight, eye on the ball, weight on back leg, follow through your swing...for some reason, I got mad at him. And he wasn't doing anything wrong; I was.

So I attended a golf clinic at our course. The most memorable phrase was our teacher yelling "No Elvis!" meaning he didn't want our swing to be in our knees (here he did a pretty impressive Elvis imitation in front of us), but in our hips. Interestingly, because the class 1) is a little older, and understood this Elvis reference and 2) was not married to the teacher, we all immediately improved.

The next day, I was sore in muscles I never knew I had - my upper left torso, my lower legs, my wrists? Do my wrists even have muscles? If they do, they were hurting. As I ate Motrin like chicklets I assured my husband I did, indeed, love golf.

My clinic included a glass of wine and appetizer, and frankly this was the best part. But I am determined to keep swinging. My kids are growing up, so I can either get in the game, or spend a lot of time away from my husband. Plus, the outfits are cute.