Day 15 -- Wild Horse Saloon, Wisconsin Rapids WI

Saturday July 13

Wow.

Ok, maybe I shouldn't have overdone it like that. Woke with a 4-alarm hangover that lasted pretty much all damn day and well into the evening. Took Tylenol to deal with the headache 3 separate times with little effect.

But nevertheless, this would be our last Wisconsin date and expected a blowout.

Wild Horse Saloon is kind of out of town in the middle of back country roads. Has a bar/grille with a much larger banquet hall attached, which was having a benefit that day for a little girl with a rare form of leukemia. Sad shit. Love and light to her and her family.

Sky that afternoon

In the gymnasium-sized banquet hall there was buffet food, raffles, a stage and band, with another stage and bands outside. And there were 1000 people there throughout the day. So we were hoping for some generous spillover crowd into the bar area, as thru it was one of the exits.

Set up in the low ceilinged cafeteria area attached to the bar but right next to the door. Kind of a wide area to cover so we were very spread out, with Eric and Matt to the right of Rick (there was a fireplace in the middle of the back wall). We kept joking about feeling distant from one another.

Photo by Rick Hornyak

I'd been guzzling water all day and was feeling a little sick even from that. After setting up gear, PA and light rig, we were all starving. Our contract said free bar food. However the bar kitchen was closed due to the benefit. Well shit.

So we make our way to the crowded banquet hall to buy some of the benefit food. We certainly did not mind paying as it was going to a good cause. Eating did little to help me feel better. Just, wow.

But the banquet hall was swinging, and our set ended an hour or so after it, so we were still very optimistic about this show being a huge blowout.

Unfortunately that was not the case... the benefit had been going on all afternoon, and our set began towards the tail end of it. Yeah a lot of people came through the bar area but most of them caught a song or so and left to go home. Well poop.

We did have a few tables of people there enjoying it. Some from previous shows (Anchor Bay show and Freddie's gig with the obnoxious lady), others people who had just wandered in and liked what they heard. So we made the most of it, and so did they! We had a blast and they followed suit. Rick even led everyone in a conga line around the venue at one point.

Smoking a ciggie outside during set break, I was reminded of one of the many reasons I love being a working musician and traveling all over. Looking up at the moon, and seeing it is at a noticeably different angle in the sky from what I am used to.

In central Texas the moon ranges from high angle to almost completely overhead. Here in Wisconsin it was much lower in the sky. Awesome.

I think it was 10pm when I finally caught my second wind and started feeling relatively human again. Good lord. Still had fun despite the bummer of a turnout. Not the blowout we were hoping for, but still a fun show regardless.