The BoneBlog

Greg and I went to Memphis over the weekend to celebrate our 4th wedding anniversary.  Here are the highlights from day one:

We stopped in Ste. Genevieve to view the Bolduc House, built in 1770.  This is a prime example of French colonial architecture.  I studied this home in my Art History & Architecture course in college.  Downtown Ste. Gen is full of awesome old homes and shops, and I'm a fan of architecture, so it was fun to drive through.

Bolduc House: 

After visiting Ste. Genevieve, we drove down to Cape Girardeau for lunch, then hit .

Greg got all indignant about these signs, which are placed before every single bridge on the highway: 

However, his faith was restored upon seeing this sign -- he's obsessed with the TV show: 

That was about all that was noteworthy about our short stint in Arkansas, except that we stopped for gas and the pump failed to shut off automatically, so Greg ended up with gasoline all over his shoes, stinking up the car.  Nice.

We were happy to see this: 

First order of business after checking into our hotel was barbecue, of course -- it was still a little early for civilized people to engage in Beale Street debauchery.  After conducting extensive research on the subject (naturally) we narrowed our bbq choices to just a few.  This evening we visited Neely's.  Neely's is located in midtown in a nondescript yellow building.  I opened my car door and heard something strange...it didn't really register with me until it sounded a second time, and I realized it was a rooster.  In the middle of Memphis.  A ROOSTER, folks.  Right next to the barbecue place.  Talk about fresh, right?

Neely's was pretty interesting -- not much for ambiance, but who needs that in their barbecue joint, right?  The food was pretty decent, especially the pulled pork.  Mmmmm.  Pork.  We got the sampler platter -- Greg insisted. 

 

After eating our fill, we headed down to Beale Street.  Here is where the photos get pretty rough, because we didn't want to lug our big camera around, so Greg was using his phone camera. 

Beale Street at night: 

We first visited Pat O'Brien's because that's where we started off in New Orleans on our honeymoon.  Lo, they were having a dessert tasting, so Greg and I made ourselves pretty sick off dessert samples.  They had a really good pianist playing that evening, but we had bigger things in mind and wanted to take in as much as possible, so we went to Silky O'Sullivan's.  I really wanted to see the beer-drinking goats, but they weren't accessible.  However, Barbara Blue was singing, and she was very good, if just a little bit crazy.  We also had some tasty raw oysters.  Yum! 

Mmm, oysters aftermath:  

Then came the ABSOLUTE HIGHLIGHT OF THE EVENING.  We headed over to the Blues City Cafe to enjoy the music of Gary Hardy and the Memphis 2.  They are a Johnny Cash tribute band.  I have been a Johnny Cash fan since long before it became the 'in' thing to be.  These guys were absolutely amazing.  If you closed your eyes, you would swear you were listening to the man himself.  It was standing room only, but we ended up with a front-row table thanks to a very nice couple who allowed us to share with them. 

Gary Hardy is very knowledgeable about his Memphis history, and well he should be -- he was the owner of Sun Studios for a time in the 80s when it reopened after a long closure.  He's also produced a lot of music, and has worked with numerous recording artists.  He has fascinating stories.

I even got to give him a hand onstage when he broke a guitar string and needed help adjusting the strap on his new guitar. Yay for me!

 

I cannot emphasize enough how cool these guys were.  If you are a fan of Johnny Cash, this is an amazing experience.  Just ask the drunk guy at the show that kept hootin' and hollerin' during the performance.   

We finally tired out and stumbled back to the hotel for the evening.  All in all, it was a really great day.  Stay tuned for Day 2!

 

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