Insanity, insanity, insanity. A trek through the vineyards of upstate New York to balmy Cleveland, Ohio where we share a basement dressing room at The Beachland with a zoftig burlesque troop and later serenade Glenn Tilbrook of Squeeze without knowing he's there till he introduces himself afterwards. Fall foliage twinkles and flutters and wishes us bon voyage. Columbus, Chicago, Milwaukee do the same. A blur of sets. Violently committing to songs whether the audience is enraptured, texting or simply absent. Invading the homes of friends and strangers and relying on my Enemies to charm them as I sleep and sniffle. Wonderful hosts everywhere! Angels, we call them. Angels! And somehow we have slalomed through the sun-addled cornfields to Minneapolis. A game of croquet with my brother and two of my nephews? How did that happen? No, we're in Dubuque Iowa wowing the sound man. Yes, sound men like us. And now a new motto: Not as bad as Des Moines. Not one I recommend for Presidential hopefuls.
A brief respite and then a daring foray south of the Mason Dixon Line. Still too exhausted to remember any of it. A show without our bass player in Ashland Virginia earns a standing ovation. Another ovation in Charlotte with Mr. Young back in the fold. They would have ovated in Atlanta as well but there weren't enough people to do such a thing. But the fabulous sound guy raved, yes he did. Did I mention sound guys fancy us? Birmingham Alabama, thank you for nurturing our remarkable host Charles Essington Walton IV. Oh yes, we played a show too to a wonderful crowd, but who cares about the music really? That was written a long time ago. It's the meetings with remarkable men, the diamonds in the thicket, the random celestial collisions. And how did we contrive to get to Augusta, Georgia after James Brown left the building? Turns out his soul had migrated just a few hundred miles away and possessed the undimmable Danielle Howle. Two historic sets with the Duchess of South Carolina, one in Columbia, the other in Charleston. Sandwiched between these two inexplicable events an encounter with a goat while on stage in Awendaw Green. Not as complimentary as I would have liked her to be but at least she didn't spend the song staring at her smart phone. Hello again, North Carolina. Goodbye again. A frozen night in Virginia, then swallowed up in the mid-November glow of the nation's capital. Friendly faces, raucous crowd, reinforcements from the Union in the shape of General McMahon and our bugler, Corporal Cordt. Turns out the English Dream never really materialized. The Wild Goosechase Expedition continues...