The Power of Joy

I spied this bike in my sister's garage. A little air, a bolt and a right pedal from the local bike shop's spare parts bin, and I have a ride! Western PA is full of cricks and hollers - those are creeks and the small drainages they create to the rest of you - and there is a road through every holler and another one up and over every hill in between. That's the good news. The bad news is that there's almost never any shoulder and they've built giant shopping complexes in areas still served by the country roads created for farmers who tilled the fields beneath the Wally Worlds and Targets that displaced them. However, once you escape (or avoid) these slices of traffic-clogged panic, the road riding here is fantastic! Quiet roads through hill and holler with a mix of corn and fallow fields stretching out to the hazy horizon. Navigation is a bit tricky, as the roads follow the cricks and don't necessarily go where you think they would. I relied on the remn...

I jumped on a flight from Seattle to Pittsburgh after seeing Jackson Browne at the Ste. Michelle winery last Friday night. He opened with an acoustic set with David Lindley, his guitarist on his classic hits and a stringed instrument virtuoso. David played with the band as well, showcasing his talents throughout the night on what appeared to be a lute, a lap steel, a dobro, a fiddle and maybe even some sort of sitar (we did not sit close and I am not an expert on acoustic instruments). The acoustic set, capped off with a solo performance by David about head cheese and rotten sandwiches served to the musicians backstage at a Marin County Health and Wellness Festival, was my favorite. Jackson came back with a stellar band and delivered what the crowd wanted, showcasing their true talents with an encore set of the blues standard 'Buy me a Mercury' and his own reggae-vibed song of hope. His values, songwriting, voice and authenticity...