Rediscovering Buck Owens

If you were like me, you knew Buck Owens, if you knew of him at all, as the toothy guy from that sappy old show Hee-Haw. I say, “if you were like me”, because I’m not like that any more. I have a new appreciation for Buck Owens. And in our upcoming roadtrip to San Juan Capistrano, we’ll be dropping by Bakersfield to pay him homage. Many scholars of country...

Christmas Cocktails. Ring-a-Ding-Ding-Ba...

If you’ve read this post, you know my throw-down challenge that I have the most extensive Christmas music collection in North America. Today, I’m going to focus on a Christmas cocktail party. And I’m going to make it easy. I’m assuming this is a last minute party and you don’t have time to gather a load of individual songs. So I’ll be focussing on a...

And Now I Can See My Imaginary Friends!

Remember the old Romper Room when Miss Vickie (or whoever your RR lady was at your local affiliate) used to hold up the Magic Mirror and intone: “Romper, Stomper, Bomper, Boo.” Then she proceeded to say that she could see all of us ankle-biters in “TV Land” and would call our names: “I see Jimmy and Mary and little Ryan. . .” Even if I didn’t...

Top Ten Cowboy Songs of All Time

A quick dinner trip to Sonoma’s Girl & The Fig the other day and the arrival of Andy last night has saved me from going completely feral as I manned the winemaking and evaluated the grape harvest alone this week. That was a week with no TV, no radio, no Internet and spotty cell reception. It was dicey Thursday when I found myself talking to wildlife – especially large, horned...