Absolutely West 4th Avenue

Sometimes I think about the small town where I was born.  If you drove the DeLorean to West Fourth Avenue in, say, 1959 (before I was born), with a current FWST or a tablet wtih Fox News or somesuch, they would not believe what has happened to the world.  Of course, the locals outside the pharmacy soda counter might try to arrange a clandestine contest between Patrol Officer Fife's cruiser and the DeLorean.

Fourth Avenue was the main business thoroughfare - angled parking on each side of the street, no center median - and all of the important community activities were based there: Banks, furniture store, grocery and drug stores, insurance agency, 5&10, hardware, Chevrolet dealer, movie theater, and filling stations.  And of course, the old High School and churches, including the one my parents got married in (a couple of years after they'd graduated from the HS).

I took a virtual tour of the street this morning on Google Maps.  Some of it looks outwardly the same, but most of the businesses are gone or changed.  A resale shop has retained the 5&10 sign of the store I frequented as a kid.  A couple of doors down was the insurance company where my grandmother worked part-time - I can't tell from the picture if there's a business operating there now. My grandparents weren't wealthy, but they were well-known and respected around town.  I can remember being amazed that my grandmother would send me to the grocery store to pick up some incidentals and I didn't have to pay any money (they put it on her monthly account) - it didn't work like that at the Kroger in Irving.

One thing that made me smile was that the old spiral slide in the city park seems to still be there.  As a kid I was endlessly entertained on that slide.



Shifting gears - a co-worker who's almost ten years older has shared with me that he's prepared a set for open mic night at a local nightspot.  I was quite impressed with his proposed setlist: Gentle on My Mind, Sloop John B, and Tomorrow is a Long Time.  He's even working on an acoustic Hotel California.

Speaking of Hotel California, I recently packed a sack lunch/dinner and traveled east of TX-360 to wish a Happy Birthday to one of its composers (and Dallas resident) at the AAC:

Seven Bridges Road (ft. Schmit & Walsh)

Dirty Laundry

Sunset Grill 

That Old Flame

Witchy Woman

When I Stop Dreaming

Talkin to the Moon

One of These Nights

I Can't Tell You Why (Schmit)

End of the Innocence

The Last Resort

- introductions- 

Just Ain't Enough (duet Patti Smyth)

Heart of the Matter

Everybody Wants to Rule the World (TfF song)

Leather & Lace (ft. Stevie Nicks)

Boys of Summer

Rocky Mountain Way (Walsh & Schmit)

Life in the Fast Lane (ft Walsh/Schmit)

Hotel California (ft Walsh/Schmit)

Wasted Time

Desperado

All She Wants to Do Is Dance (Stevie on tambourine)

Birthday (Beatles song, ft. Nicks, Walsh, Schmit)

The show ran nearly three hours, with no intermission of encores.  Opportunities for Donald Hugh to rest his voice came in the form of Timothy B. doing I Can't Tell You Why, and Joe Walsh's Rocky Mountain Way (probably the best version I've ever heard), along with the Smyth and Nicks duets.