The evening activity was much more worthwhile. We went to a celebration at church for Gil and Louise: 40 years in the ministry!!! It was so interesting to hear from people who have known the Georges throughout their ministry and to hear first hand about many of their amazing experiences. They've touched a lot of lives.
On Sunday morning, I took the kids to church while Rob headed out to Ste. Chapelle. I taught children's church with Zach as my helper.
We picked up a few extra shows this week due to illness in Ric's family. Ric has been running sound in Boise for over 20 years. Back in the late eighties and early nineties, Rob was in a band called Rock Candy and Ric would run their sound from time to time. We were all scared of him back then, but he's just an old softy now. When Rob started the case company 7 years ago, Ric was one of his first customers and they built a solid friendship as Ric did all he could to support Rob's business. By the time Rob started running sound, I think Ric knew he had some real competition. He could have written Rob off then and there, but instead, he has always supported us and even thrown business our way. He has always opened his shop to us to loan us any equipment we might be in need of over the years. We've been able to reciprocate this year and we've worked pretty closely with Ric all summer. Ric's mom has been battling cancer and this week he needed to spend some time with her. Even though we already had a show scheduled in Baker City, OR on Monday, we picked up a Sunday show at Ste Chapelle and a Tuesday show at the Egyptian. After church I packed, dropped the kids off at grandma's house and met Rob out in Nampa where he already had the truck loaded from his afternoon concert. We left my car in the parking lot and headed for Baker in the big truck. It was actually a really nice Sunday drive.
The truck can't go much faster than 50 mph, so we took our time and enjoyed the scenery.
We were provided with a hotel room for two nights as part of our payment so we settled into our room and relaxed for the rest of the evening. We were up bright and early on Monday morning to set up for the concert. Everything went smoothly and we were ready to go when the artists showed up at 3:00 p.m.
It's always "interesting" working with the pros. These guys were very easy to work with but you could tell they've had plenty of bad experiences with sound companies in the past. Rob was totally micro-managed until they finally figured out that he knew what he was doing. That's always frustrating to me and I want to assure people right off the bat that they are in very good hands with Rob but I just bite my tongue and wait 'til they figure it out. I'm glad I didn't check out their website before the concert because it would have caused me great stress knowing they have made quite a name for themselves, especially the musician that portrayed John Lennon in this Beatles tribute band: http://www.revolutionlive.com/
The sound check went fine and I settled into my place at the side of the stage with the monitor board.
The show went very smoothly until almost the very end when a guitar amp went out. The high school band teacher that hired us also provided the equipment for the concert but when something like this goes wrong, it becomes our problem pretty quickly. It all worked out in the end but I officially resigned to Rob as monitor tech for pro bands!!
After the show, Rob and I loaded everything back into the truck and debated about when to drive back to Boise. I was stressing about the Egyptian show that we needed to set up for as early as possible so I suggested we drive back at midnight to ensure we'd have plenty of time. We were both starving so we packed up our stuff, turned in our keys and had dinner at a near-by truck stop. By the time we finished eating, we realized we were exhausted. Visions of the last Sun Valley trip went through my mind and we decided it was too big of a risk to drive when we were already too tired to keep our eyes open. Thankfully, the hotel clerk gave us back our keys and we fell gratefully into bed. Morning came too soon, however, as we drug ourselves out of bed at 6:30 a.m.
The trip back was uneventful and we made great time. We stopped to pick up my car in Nampa and Rob went straight to the Egyptian while I dropped by the house to pick up the kids. We were actually a little bit ahead of schedule, so I gave in to the kid's request to drive to the very top of the parking garage:
I've always tried to avoid downtown in the past, but because we have been working so much at the Egyptian the last few weeks, I'm becoming pretty adept at navigating things. Downtown Boise really is a cool place. I love this picture with the dome of the Capitol Building in the background:
Right above The Egyptian:
Gloria thought it was a great adventure. Simple pleasures:
All three of these shows have had ticket sales which always adds a worry factor for me. If something goes wrong on our end, we could be responsible for refunding the tickets. I'm sure this happens from time to time, but we've been fortunate so far. The set-up went just fine and Curtis Stigers and his band combined the sound check with a rehearsal for a couple of hours in the afternoon:
As I sat in the balcony before the show, I looked down at the stage and just felt a sense of wonder at how far we've come in 4 years. As much as I've rebelled at times and as many tears have fallen over my own (perceived) lost dreams, I still believe that this is all from the hand of God. He has given me every drop of strength that I have needed to get this far. Not that it's been handed to us on a silver platter by any means, but I believe this is what Rob was created to do. This is our stage, built by our own hands; we built these cases, probably in the middle of the night, that hold the gear that we've bought with blood, sweat and tears. Through hindsight, in this moment, I can see that it's all been worth it.
We hired Kurt to run the monitor board since I resigned from that on Monday, so the kids and I got to kick back in the balcony and enjoy the show. We have another show in here on Thursday so everything stays set up. I left before the end of the show, because I could, and went home with a very real sense of satisfaction with my life.
The trip back was uneventful and we made great time. We stopped to pick up my car in Nampa and Rob went straight to the Egyptian while I dropped by the house to pick up the kids. We were actually a little bit ahead of schedule, so I gave in to the kid's request to drive to the very top of the parking garage:
I've always tried to avoid downtown in the past, but because we have been working so much at the Egyptian the last few weeks, I'm becoming pretty adept at navigating things. Downtown Boise really is a cool place. I love this picture with the dome of the Capitol Building in the background:
Right above The Egyptian:
Gloria thought it was a great adventure. Simple pleasures:
All three of these shows have had ticket sales which always adds a worry factor for me. If something goes wrong on our end, we could be responsible for refunding the tickets. I'm sure this happens from time to time, but we've been fortunate so far. The set-up went just fine and Curtis Stigers and his band combined the sound check with a rehearsal for a couple of hours in the afternoon:
As I sat in the balcony before the show, I looked down at the stage and just felt a sense of wonder at how far we've come in 4 years. As much as I've rebelled at times and as many tears have fallen over my own (perceived) lost dreams, I still believe that this is all from the hand of God. He has given me every drop of strength that I have needed to get this far. Not that it's been handed to us on a silver platter by any means, but I believe this is what Rob was created to do. This is our stage, built by our own hands; we built these cases, probably in the middle of the night, that hold the gear that we've bought with blood, sweat and tears. Through hindsight, in this moment, I can see that it's all been worth it.
We hired Kurt to run the monitor board since I resigned from that on Monday, so the kids and I got to kick back in the balcony and enjoy the show. We have another show in here on Thursday so everything stays set up. I left before the end of the show, because I could, and went home with a very real sense of satisfaction with my life.
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