Big Leather Couch

Nancy and I drove down to Tunica, MS on Saturday. Tunica is where the state of Mississippi decided to set up the second largest casino complex in the US. It is spread out so the number of casinos is deceiving.

Anyway, they also have a Riverwalk and a Museum of the Mississippi River and an aquarium. It is also the port of the Tunica Queen. It is a nice ship, well maintained and clean. There are two level inside and luckily we were on the lower level near the main buffet. The diners on the second floor can watch over a railing around the center of the ship opening to the main deck.

There is also an upper level, where you can sit outside and Saturday was a wonderful night for that. The temps were about 65-70, light breeze. The staff is very friendly and helpful. They pride themselves on their Prime Rib and the Chef/carver came out and danced around the buffet table and got the diners excited.

The Prime Rib was excellent. They also had Turkey breast which was moist and tasty. There is a bar on board and Nancy and I each had a beer, but stayed away from the frozen drinks they were hawking.

There was a DJ doing his best to get people onto the dance floor and some did, but it was more line-dancing than anything else, and well, we sat them out.

Two hours after we pulled away we docked. Back in the car for the 45 minute ride home. I thjink we might try one of the sightseeing sails during the day next spring.

We used the evening as a celebration, as it was on the 24th (Sunday), three years ago we had our first 'meet and greet' drink through match.com.  

The best thing about it? We used a Groupon which was the deal of the day a few months back. Groupon is really a great idea, which has been copied in some manners by others. Normally, the dinner would have been $47.oo/person. With the Groupon, we paid $25.00 each, almost a 50% savings.

NO..This is not a paid advertisement. I get nothing for this except to inform those who might not have heard of them or if you are skeptical.

Really excited about tonight's show...remember, if you can't catch it live (MNF, DWTS, BUSY) - check out the archives at the BlogTalk Radio Site or at the Music On The Couch Blog.

From the Mississippi Delta comes Ms. Eden Brent a woman who can give you a soft loving sound or a full-blown juke-joint rumble. Her skills on the Piano earned her the 2010 PINETOP PERKINS PIANO PLAYER OF THE YEAR.

"Blind Mississippi" Morris (Cummings) will also come sit on The Couch. Mr. Cummings is a staple here in Memphis both as a solo artist and with his band The Pocket Rockets.

He was rated one of the 10 best harmonica players in the world by Bluzharp magazine. He has performed with musicians such as B. B. King, Rufus Thomas, Muddy Waters, David Porter.

MONDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2010
10pm Eastern; 9pm Central; 8pm Mountain; 7pm Pacific

This is a request, nay a plea for y'all to extend some love. "Blind Mississippi Morris" Cummings is a staple here in Memphis and around the globe in the blues world.A smiling, joyous talented man indeed. 

Sunday evening, he and his wife partook in an evening meal at the local Cracker Barrel. When they returned to their car they were stunned to find it had been broken into and a number of items stolen.

The lowlifes who perpetrated this heinous act took a .44-caliber Magnum Ruger and a .45-caliber Springfield; a laptop, with all of its calendar listings, bookings, accounting and music files; and a vintage 1949 microphone Morris had just bought for $1,200. They also took the handicap sticker from the car!

Scary that these two guns, owned and registered by responsible adults are now in the hands of people who exist lower than whale sperm at the bottom of the ocean.

The calendar is the lifeblood of a musician...his accounting records, very important of course; maybe the thieves can be found if they use the parking sticker and an observant officer notices (that is if they even send that information out to the beat cops).

Oh worst of all, ALL 50 of Morris' harps were stolen. He bought a microphone out of pawn for $200.00 and was going to pawn a guitar until his son lent him $100 to buy 4 harmonicas for a booking he had on Tuesday at B.B. Kings here on Beale. Morris played...there were songs he could not perform because he did not have the correct keyed harp.

But he played...and I have talked about this before...the gig netted him $100.00!

So, now a builder of harps has offered to make Morris 8 harps for a deeply discounted price of $640.00 He has a paypal account. Any funds raised will cover the cost of those 8 and any additional funds raised over the $640.00 will result in additional harps being made. Deak is contributing all his labor for free.  A generously kind act by a fellow musician...That is what makes these folks so special and why I have so enjoyed spending time and getting to know them better.

The paypal account is deakharp@hughes.net. On your receipt it will have a woman's name (not putting it here - if you want it send me an email please)

Karma is a B**CH and these guys will get theirs...we are hoping Morris is covered in good karma.

Thanks

OH, Morris is one of my guests Monday on Music On The Couch. Come on by and show him some love.

And remember, if you can't be there live, then check out the archives at Music On The Couch Blog. The Monday show is normally up there by Tuesday at noon central. I said normally! You can also subscribe at ITunes and have the show automatically downloaded to your computer. Though I don't get stats for those! So go to one of the two links above and that should do it.


I have to stop rambling now...thank you for your kind attention...

BUT...Not until I tell you that as I was putting this up for posting, we found out that $200.00 was donated by the generous Bobby Joe Owens and Retro Deluxe. Bobby Joe was a guest on Music On The Couch on September 28th. He saw my postings on Facebook and stepped up.

SPECTACULAR!

The news article is HERE

Each week TRAVIS from "Trav's Thoughts" hosts Five On Friday where we get to select five songs of any mix we care....


Check out the other participants by clicking on his link above...and join in!

You can register for free at playlist.com and type in a band name and BAM the song will be there to assist in building your playlist.

Travis lays out some guidelines for this meme and they go like this:

1. Grab the banner, make your post title Five on Friday, and be sure to link back here.

2. Go to Playlist.com to make your play list of five songs. Choose a particular theme to share with us. You can simply post the play list, or you can add a little summary about what you are sharing.

3. I don't know how to make a specific linky, so be sure to leave me a comment to let me know that you participated.

4. No tags, but feel free to invite your friends to play along if they need a post topic on a Friday.

So, this week I did a variation of the iPod Shuffle. Instead of putting the iTouch on shuffle and letting it pick five songs, I flicked my finger on the window and let the artists rotate by and then - without looking - I stopped it and whatever artist was there, I then selected a song from them.

Now, I actually tried to select songs that were not their most popular song, to give a different feel...

So, here they are - ENJOY AND HAVE A GRAND WEEKEND