Chillin' in ridiculous heat

Rita left us completely unscathed weather-wise in Austin, except for providing a nice breeze for outdoor activities, which was most welcome in this searing heat.

The festival in Waco with Del Castillo and the Jug Band that I had been planning was cancelled. Waco was originally right in the path of the inland storm track before it turned eastward, but I doubt they ended up with more than just a little wind and rain. The other non-weather Rita situation we have in Austin and all over east and central Texas is that we are out of or very short on gasoline. Austin was already packed with evacuees from Katrina and then Rita, plus we've got just a few folks in town for that little shebang, the ACL festival.

This is our first time to not go to the ACL festival. (My 2004 recap and pics are linked from this page) Usually we have gotten lucky and gotten the super-cheap early-bird tickets, but that didn't happen and we didn't care to pay the high-prices for something destined to be overly crowded and possibly overheated (as it has been way too hot for 3 out of the 4 years they've had it, the other year it was cooler and raining. I have one word to say to the people who put on this show: October... make that 2 words: late October. Forget September. Ugh.) On Sunday afternoon as I post this, here's the current reading, just a degree or so hotter than yesterday. They just said on News 8 Austin that ABIA (the airport) just broke the heat record with 108. September. It's the new August.

Instead of ACL we went down to the Pecan Street Festival, the freebee they have on 6th Street. had lunch at a great new Korean restaurant, Koriente, which has lots of veggie (vegan even) selections, healthy and low fat options. Some people pics from Pecan Street. On the left is a street musician named "19th Street Red", and on the right is a living statue. He scared the total crap out of a girl passing by when she saw him move. She screamed!

At Pecan Street we saw Dave Sebree, who is one of the best guitarists in Texas. He is president of the Austin School of Music and plays very few gigs, so it was a real treat to see him. I had seen him play acoustic a couple of times before at a private party, very informal, and he is awesome. He's very melodic, a little jazzy here and there, kind of in the same mode as Eric Johnson, Van Wilks and maybe Steve Morse. Beautiful stuff. You can listen to a song of his by going to this page, and under ALL FACULTY select David Sebree. (It's a flashy site so I can't give a direct link, and the navbar is a little tricky but worth it. Lots of other nice samples from other musicians there too). His final song was a rockin' cover of Led Zeppelin's Moby Dick.

In the evening we went to the Alamo Drafthouse and saw "The Corpse Bride". It was really wonderful, very funny, great characters! Cutest spider and maggot I've ever seen. Recommended!

After that we went to Momo's for a late set with the South Austin Jug Band. Watched them for 2 hours and ran out of steam. We were the old folks in the crowd, it was 1:30 a.m., we'd been at it since 11 a.m. (now technically the previous day), and were beat.

Monday it's supposed to be nearly, if not just as hot as today, then some clouds should be rolling in taking us down in the low 90s. I hope so.


- Music - Austin -