An Exceedingly Lengthy Post: August 22-26

Wednesday, August 22nd:

We spent the afternoon and evening preparing for an upcoming show. The truck was already loaded from our show in Caldwell but we still had to load everything we would need for the canopy. This show will require just about everything we have.

This will be our second year on this event. Last year was a trial run with mostly friends and family of the band and home owner. This year it was advertised with flyers and is being billed as Owyhee Summer Nights. Basically, this is a farmer/rancher who has a gorgeous spread on the top of a hill who loves music and has a great venue for this type of event. He is a relative of Beau, from Straightaway, so we are in on the ground floor of something that could grow bigger every year. When we booked this event a couple of months ago, we knew the date would fall on our anniversary but decided to do it anyway since it also has a fun factor. Brian, the owner, asked if we would perform on the stage during the event. We agreed to sing a couple of songs with Straightaway but I was still surprised to see our names on the flyer:

After loading and planning, we headed home for another midnight dinner:

Zach has had a touch of Gloria's bug:

Thursday, August 23rd:

Bright and early Thursday morning we headed out to Melba. (The kids were fortunate enough to have an excuse to stay home: an end-of-summer neighborhood party.) This is where we'll be living for the next 4 days:

Brian had to cut a path through the alfalfa field to get our rigs to the set-up area:

The location is beautiful:

It was a very tricky stage set-up because of the hilly terrain. We had to use the level continuously to beat the optical illusions of what looked level to our eyes but in reality, was way off kilter.

The whole process was made more difficult because of the unlevel ground. We were always going up and down hill.

After the stage was put together and leveled, we put together the truss for the canopy and lights:

It looks like Rob is golfing here, but he's just pounding in the stakes that will keep the canopy secure:

The stage is ready and the structural part of the canopy is complete. Time to head to Nampa for Nampa Nights. This is the view from the top of the driveway:

I went home to pack the motor home and pick up the kid's while Dale and Rob set up Nampa Nights for The Mystics. When I got home, Gloria and Allie were both fast asleep in her room after a long afternoon of playing and swimming. I let her sleep while I packed the motor home and got everything ready. She woke up crying that her ear hurt bad. When I looked at the sore ear, I could see an orange colored goop seeping out from her inner ear. I knew she must have ruptured her ear drum and since it was too late to get into the doctor's office, we headed, once again, to the ER. Sure enough, the ear drum had ruptured and the doctor prescribed Amoxicillan and some ear drops. Even though Gloria had been feeling much better, her illness had caused liquid to build up in the inner ear and the swimming probably caused it to push through.

Rob met us at Walmart to get the prescriptions and to pick up supplies for the next few days, including a new game of Aggravation. Pretty fitting, I think.

All the medication finally allowed Gloria to have a good night's sleep for the first time in about a week.

Friday, August 24th:
Rob and I were up by 8:30 a.m. to finish the canopy and set up sound and lights. More uphill maneuvering.

Gloria took a big nap on the gorgeous lawn:

The canopy was very tricky to put up in the wind:

The canopy is zip-tied onto the back section of truss and then pulled over the top to be attached to the front truss with canopy ties. Dale is very, very handy at this but he is spending some time with Brandon this weekend, so it fell to the kid's and I to help Rob. We're just not tall enough to be much help!

Gloria and I drove into Boise for a few last minute things, including the projector we'd be using for the movie tonight. Zach stayed behind to help Rob and must have worked way too hard:

By late afternoon, we were all exhausted.

While I was gone, Rob hung all the lights and worked on the audio:

It's always nice to have my hammock out on these events even though I rarely get to make use of it!!

Things kind of fell apart over the next few hours. I was so tired. I hadn't slept well all week due to Gloria's misery and we spent two days trudging up and down this lawn so we could be ready for this event. Since this is a ground floor event, we agreed to do this for very little money in exchange for plenty of help (labor) and food for three days. All day Friday, it was just us. Granted, Brian had plenty to do himself to get things ready, but he had indicated in earlier conversations that we would have help. Around 7:30, some of the guys from Straightaway showed up to drop off their gear and another gal came with her keyboard hoping to have a sound check.

While Rob and I continued to struggle to get things ready, they all stood at the top of the hill chatting. Part of the frustration was just the lack of communication. It's not any one's fault, it's just a bad situation. These are all good people who couldn't know how exhausted we were. (They might have had a little clue just looking down the hill at the set-up, but, in their defense, they aren't mind readers.) My breaking point came when the girl with the keyboard was patiently waiting to set up and it hit me that I had spent two full days setting up my stage and sound system so that other people could just show up and perform on it. In passing, I mentioned to Rob that it would have been nice to have a little help (with tears in my eyes) and he bee-lined up the hill to chew some butt. This was not my intention at all, but what can you do?? We were quickly surrounded by people wanting to do something when just about everything was already done. All I wanted to do was hide under the stage (which I actually did for about 5 minutes!!!) Beau helped Rob lift the speakers up onto the subs and Beau's wife brought me a hamburger!

The kids had a great time running on the lawn with Beau's kids and the dogs:

Rob and Brian had also discussed showing a movie on Friday night for "everyone" but he apparently didn't mention it to anyone else. So, we're finally set-up to show the movie and only a handful of people are there to watch it.

Regardless of how many people were there, it was fun to watch cars through the big sound system on the big screen!

Saturday, August 25:

Morning came way too soon. Rob and I talked until 3:00 a.m. and Lucy woke me up at 7:30. Gloria is sleeping much better and the antibiotics have definitely kicked in.

Saturday was a much easier day since we were already set-up. We had a few details to take care of, but nothing stressful. I even had a chance to sing a couple of songs from the stage with my very own wireless mic. There were very few people around, but the point wasn't to be heard but to enjoy the fruits of my labor!! The actual event started around 2:00 with several different people taking the stage. There was a very talented 14 year old girl who sang original songs, a Christian band with a female lead singer, a bluegrass group composed of mom, dad and teenage son, and a quartet from Bethel Nazarene Church that sang the National Anthem:

Lori came out in the afternoon to hang out with me. I love Lori:

Brandon is in town for a few weeks, so she and Dale came out and kept us company:

Straightaway took the stage in the late afternoon and were joined briefly by this talented teen:

Zach spent a lot of time hanging out side-stage on the hammock:

I'm guessing there were around 200 people in attendance. Many of them were our regular crowd from Nampa Nights:

The day was enjoyable and mostly non-stressful. The sunset was beautiful:

Straightaway entertained the crowd:

Right in the middle of their second set, they announced that they had a few special surprises for a couple in the crowd that was celebrating their anniversary. I was standing at the monitor board, side-stage, and Rob was out at front-of-house. I looked up and saw Brian carrying a big, beautiful bouquet of flowers towards the stage. For the next 20 minutes, they made this huge deal out of our anniversary! I had to take a very long walk our to front-of-house with everyone watching and clapping as Straightaway dedicated and sang a love song to us. I think we were supposed to go down front and dance together, but we were both a little bit in shock so we just stood there trying to gaze at each other!!!! Then they made us go up on stage where Brian gave us the flowers and a group of people (a representation from several of the groups we had run sound for during the day) came up and sang us a cheesy, sweet love song:

Beau went on and on and on about how great we are and how hard we work, yada, yada, yada. . . It was embarassing but nice to hear. . .

I decided about that time that if I was ever going to sing on my stage in front of a crowd, now was the time. I whispered to Beau that I had a song to sing to Rob. We sang the song, Valentine together and it was sappy and sweet and really fun.

Straightway took the stage again while I recovered from all the excitement.

I wandered around a little and took some pics of Gloria on the climbing wall.

I had several people ooh and ahh over the fact that Rob and I are musical and not just sound techs. I know it probably sounds selfish and weird, but it was very validating somehow. I've spent a lot of time during the last 3 years trying to repress the loss and sadness I have felt over setting up for performers and never being one and this was just the shot-in-the-arm I needed.

I took about 170 pictures during the day. I got a few good ones:

Later in the evening, Beau asked the crowd if they wanted to hear Rob and Tanya sing again. I wasn't sure I was ready to sing with the band since we had only run over a couple of songs a few weeks ago, but I decided to bite the bullet and go for it.

I sang I Will Survive, Strongest Weakness, and Redneck Woman. I got in big trouble with Gloria for the last one because it has a couple of swear words. When I sing it around the house I substitute heck and darn but on stage I sang it as written. When I came off stage I got the lecture of my life. She was so disappointed in me and was shocked that I would do such a thing.

After much discussion, we prayed together and I asked God to forgive me and Gloria recovered from the whole ordeal. Yikes! I guess I'm glad my 8 year old has stronger morals than I do!!
For the most part, it was a really fun experience. There was a good crowd of dancers in front of the stage as well as several pre-teen girls that kept giving me the thumbs up sign while yelling, "YOU ROCK!!!!" (These same girls even asked for my autograph after the show!!!! That was funny!) Rob sat in on several more songs with Straightaway while Lori tried to get him the perfect sound in his monitor. Poor Lori.



While Lori suffered, I watched Zach trying to keep 2 young kids off of his hammock. He wasn't very successful and even gave up for awhile since they wouldn't leave him alone. It was pretty humorous.

I wandered around taking more pictures:

Beau:

Beau and Greg hamming it up for the camera:

Kurt is a lot of fun and always keeps me and Lori laughing at side-stage:

Greg on the bass:

Scotty is probably my favorite. He's just an all-around nice guy who has always encouraged and appreciated me:

Jerry on the drums:

Straightaway:

Dale's audience blinders are still working great:

The show ended at 11:00 even though the crowd begged for more:

Group picture:

Although we were all pretty tired, we still had to tear down as much as possible since we have a 3:00 stage set-up in Boise on Sunday.

Gloria freaked out when a moth landed on her hand:

Pretty AND harmless:

Lori and Brandon stayed around to help:

The kids warmed up under the hot lights:

Brandon found shelter from the wind:

Sunday, August 26th:

We started taking the rest of it down by 8:30 a.m. Dale and Brandon had pitched a tent and were up bright and early, too, to get everything loaded up:

Lucy and Emma had a great time over the weekend with all this space to play in:

More uphill work:

The kids built a fort using only a tarp, a few strategically placed anchors and the wind:

All loaded up and ready to leave by 1:00 p.m.

We had four vehicles caravaning back into the valley. We stopped for a drink at the nearest Chevron and Rob realized that he had blown one of the rear dualies on the box truck. Ugh.

We were in a real time crunch since we still had to unload and load a few things and be in downtown Boise for a stage set-up at 3:00. Rob decided to let the truck slowly limp home rather than leave it in Nampa. I'm sure our slow caravan made quite the picture to other travelers:

Miraculously, we arrived at the next event location with just enough time to set-up the stage and light trees:

This is a small, posh affair for the opening of the new BSU Fiesta Bowl documentary:

We've all grown tired of setting up this stage:

Our outdoor stage is just a little too dirty for a posh indoor party so Rob had to mop it!!

It was a very long 4 days but we survived. I went home and took a big fat nap and Rob went to sleep for the night at 7:30! Another stage/canopy/sound set up tomorrow and then we'll have a couple of days to recover.