The Stories change, go away, come back…..The paste from the WP to the Web is always an experience of wonder and why did it do that! Oh well, read what you like. Have a laugh and share a story with a friend. Remember--“Truth is Stranger then Fiction”.

But that’s another story…….

A series of stories unrelated by time or reason, dates or places or people. A bunch of stories that seemed like more or less the truth as I remembered them. Some have been told so many time they have been embellished by no fault of my own but because the need to renew the experience and taste the chase of life and laughter and love causes the mind to seek a sparkle, a glow, a twist and turn that might have happened. And did indeed, as I remembered it.

1. My First Four Days in ‘Nam

2. My First Kudos in Vietnam.

3. Green Coffee

4. IS IT REALLY A VACATION?

5. HOW TO MAKE AN ASS OF YOURSELF!

6. How Much is the Booze Worth?

7. Saint Mary’s. Knee Deep in Dust, Volcano Dust

8. THE BEST DAMN FIDDLE MUSIC YOU EVER HEARD!

9. GATER AIDE , VODKA AND A RECORDING STUDIO

10. ONCE THERE WAS A LITTLE GREEN BUD

11. WHAT’S A HOT SHOWER WORTH?

12. MY FIRST TAX RETURN

OR

HOW I KILLED MY FIRST CLIENT!

13. SWIMMING IN THE WATER TRUCK

OR

WHERE DID THAT NEW GUY GO?

14. THE MARIJUANA MANUFACTURER

15. THE NIGHT THE OLD POPCORN ALL MACHINE KNOCKED,

JON THOMAS, THE FISHERMAN, OUT COLD!

16. Six Bucks

17. The Magic Fiddle

18. The Crows

19. The Yellow Jackets

20. The Mouse in the Speaker Box.

21. Harmony Lessons

22. The 22 Miles House

23. Leon or Santa?

24. Sound at the WOW Hall

25. There’s a Snow Storm Ahead!

Really, they began as my friend Gary dropped me off at the front gate of the Oakland Army Base. I had already said good-by to my Ma an Pa. I had kissed my slut of a girlfriend good bye

(that's another chapter) and I was ready to fly off to some strange land and get my young ass shot at or worse! I check in at the gate or desk or somewhere, who knows? I found a bunk, one of many I had already slept in with many more to come and then I did what any good soldier would do. I got drunk. I must have had a good one ‘cause I don't remember much until we landed in Cam Rham Bay, South Vietnam.

When we landed in Cam Rhan Bay at noon on Wednesday. That was really strange. We had taken off from Oakland on Wednesday at noon. A day lost? A day gained? I never did figure that out but it just seemed to start the whole damn adventure off on the wrong foot. We were shuffled off to dusty big brown tents. Everyone was wearing brown clothes. The trucks were brown. No. Everything and I mean everything was covered in brown dust. We shed our fancy uniforms with our meaningless dingle bobs attached here and there, put on our stateside fatigues and headed for the bar, of course. After sucking down a few warm beers things didn’t seem so bad.

Just about then artillery rounds started exploding on the horizon and seemed to be moving closer.

Were they ours or theirs? The greenhorns (us) were looking around and waiting for some cue or sign to indicate running for cover or.......kiss our ass good by. The old timers, the really brown guys just kept drink their beers so we kept drinking ours. And so a pattern was set. Watch the dirty brown guys and do what they do. They got really drunk so we did too! I guess that was OK ‘cause the next day rolled slowly around and found us climbing aboard some really weird old big plane that looked like a pregnant guppy. It was a C forty something or other. What a tub. It was one of those planes that can hold a couple of tanks. Instead they took a whole bunch of us and had us throw our duffel bags in and then climb on top them. Translove Airways it was not.

After taxing around for what seemed forever we finally got airborne and settled into a routine flight or so we thought. When we landed the back door opened and I saw the pilot walking around with his flashlight, it was almost midnight, and I followed him. He was counting bullet holes in the wings. It seemed we had come under fire as we were landing. We didn’t feel a thing.

I suppose we were lucky it happened so close to the landing zone. Suddenly the end of the runway lights up with explosions and flashes that were moving towards us! We grabbed our gear and ran to a big sandbagged wall and flung ourselves against it. It was pitch black. All the lights had been cut off. The air filled with the sounds of choppers firing up and machine gun fire coming from everywhere!

“WOW!”, I yelled at the guy next to me. “ I wonder if its always like this!”

“Nah” he replied in a knowing smirk, “We’re all assigned to the First Log out of Long Bien.

All we’re going to is push paper around and ship supplies to the grunts. We got it made!”

Little did we know we were already in Long Bien and our orders were already being changed. We spend the rest of the night on the runway and in the morning we were moved to a holding area and handed our new orders.

Where the hell is the 9th Infantry and why am I going to it? Me and about twenty other guys were shuffled off to a different staging area and told to sit down and wait. What the heck was going on now? Different size trucks and jeeps rolled by, stopped, picked up some guys here and there. Breakfast went by and more trucks and jeeps drove by, around and over us, picked up other guys with different sets of papers. Lunch went by and more truck picked up more guys and still we sat. This couldn’t be good. About 2pm three large deuce’s lead by a ¾ ton rolled up in a huge cloud of dust. They were going about forty and ground to a halt right in front of us! Damn, this couldn’t be good. Each truck had two guys. Each guy was dressed almost identically. Filthy helmets, flak vest with no shirts underneath. Jungle pants and jungle boots. Each rig had a .50 caliber machine gun mounted on the top of the cab. The ¾ ton had some big damn gun thing that I’d never seen before. Every human and every piece of equipment was the same color. Dirt Brown.

The men in the truck seem to be in their thirties or so but as the trucks rumbles to a stop I saw that they were the same age as me, 18, 19, 20 tops. Their eyes were old. Later I learned that this was slack time for these short timers. Bopping into town to get the new cannon fodder. Smoking rope and drinking warm beer ‘till you puke. Stuffing your face with speed or smack, whatever you can get and as much as you can do. What the hell, what they going to do if they catch you? Send you to Nam? One of the trucks screech to a halt right in front of me and my heart sunk into my boots when I saw the front bumper. Thru the mud covered surface I could barley see the words.

I would be seeing that a lot in the next 365 days. Three days had gone by. I was going to the base camp of the 9th. Shit! With my MOS (job description) I could be send to any unit. I was a Chemical Warfare Specialist. Gas, Flame Throwers all that stuff. Every Infantry, Armor and Engineering outfit used us. A 54B20 with and 11B20 ( infantry) back up MOS I was screwed!

Our heads were pretty heavy on that ride out of Long Bien. There were thousands of guys there with aircraft and armor everywhere. As we drove out of safe harbor my mind became a blank slate. Imprinting on to my now blank slate was green. Green trees, jungle, water, it was all green.

There was just rice paddies and jungle all around us. We drove and drove past water buffalo and little people in cone head hats. No one looked at us. No one waved to us. Maybe this is why we were all given flak vest and helmets. The sides of the truck were lined with sandbags and these guys MOVED these rigs down there road with the throttle wide open. Well, what the heck. At least were on a paved road. It can’t be too bad where we’re going. With that thought in my head the trucks rolled off the pavement and on to a dirt road with out even a down shift. I looked at our pitiful little group and realized we to had turned brown, dirt brown. Our color for the next 362 days.

We rumbled to a stop in front of a collection of large tents. Everywhere were tents. Tents, Artillery pieces, trucks and choppers. Lots and lots of chopper. Hundreds of choppers. APC’s rolled by in every direction stirring up dust like giant vacuum cleaners with the bags off. By now it was about 5pm. We were herded into a holding area and ordered over to supply tent. There we got our jungle gear and our weapons. This was getting a little to real. Then, once again, thrown into a truck and carted to the far side of the base camp. We were issued ammo and got a quick lesson in how to use the AR-15. What a piece of junk. Probably the worst rifle ever made.

Most of us had never fired an automatic rifle on full auto. The rifle climbs fast and up to the right. Weird, and hard to control. Everyone was shooting up into the sky. Everyone but me that is. Mine rifle continually jammed. A forbearing of things to come. By the time everyone else had fired off fifty or so rounds I was still trying to unjam the first round. Play time was over. This piece of junk was mine for the next year. The damn thing never did work right.

Later, in the mess tent, we were eating something that I think was stew. A tiny oriental officer marched into the tent and announced we were going on patrol that night. Wait. I’m in country for three days and I’m going on patrol. PATROL! Yep. That’s exactly what we did. We finish dinner, divided into squads, got our gear, marched to the parameter wall and climbed right over. We walked straight out into the jungle. I had been in ‘Nam for three days and I had just eaten something that I knew would give me the shits and I marching in a column of geeks out into the JUNGLE>JUNGLE>. It was thicker than any Northwest or Pacific coast forest I had ever seen or been in. It was amazing! We walked past the cleared area around the base camp and were swallowed into the lush green jungle like a tiger swallows a mouse.

I was near the back of the column and had sort of attached myself to an older Sergeant with a lot of weird looking patches, strip, and stuff all over him. He had arrived wearing jungles clothes and I found out he had been here before, several times. He was recently divorced and happy to be back. Not a smart move on my part.

“Hey this a cakewalk buddy, we’re just going our about a mile, dig in and be back in time for breakfasts.” He told me with a grin.

“Really?” I replied like an idiot.

“No problem, just stick by me”

Well, advice from an older Sergeant, maybe twenty five is always welcome.

“Hey Sergeant! You and that private next to you take the point!” Orders the Captain.

Forward. To the Point. Take the Lead. You go First. Right Behind You Buddy.........................

You see, the point is not the most desirable place to be. You go our twenty of thirty yards in front of everyone else and hope you don’t step on or in anything or anybody. I was stunned. The jungle was crisscrossed with hundreds of little trails going helter skelter in all directions. A road appeared out of nowhere and disappeared into nowhere. We came to a small clearing where some hills about as high as our heads offered a shady place to rest. About a dozen or so hills. Ant hills. BIG ANT HILLS! Covered with ants, ants all over, ants all over the tree I’m leaning against. Ants all over my arms that was touching the tree. Ants all over me.

My arm was black with ants and they were heading up to my face. I screamed and fell backwards as I swatted and brushes and knocked these ANTS off my arm. I slapped myself silly slapping them off my face.

Everyone got a good laugh out of it and the Captain was gracious enough to use the incident as a reminder to look before we leap, sit or otherwise.

We only went a few hundred yard more when the Captain ordered us down for the night. We dug in. Dug in? We’re sleeping here? Me and the old Sarge moved out about thirty yards in front and settled in beside a well worn path. Great Idea Sarge. There was already a hole of sorts there so we just kind of wiggled in, arranged our gear hear and there and watch sun fall out of sky like a big lead ball and then it was dark. Real dark. I could not see my hand in front of my face. The Sarge and I took turns staring off into the void, the blackness, the abyss. Sometime around midnight there was a rustling in the bushes right in front of me. I flipped off my safety and assumed a position ready to fire! A shape appeared about ten feet in front of me. Wait......that’s no man...........it’s..........it’s..........it’s a goddamn tiger! HE IS COMING TO EAT ME! He is going to eat everyone............I HAVE TO STOP HIM!!!!!!!!!!!! Just as I was about to open fire. A hand pulled me back and whispered low in a voice, “Freeze, Don’t move! Shhhhh.” The tiger walked right passed me. I could have touched him. He could have turned his head and bit mine off. Turns out he was just slumming. He was after bit of food left from the c rations we had strewn about. A base camp vagabond. A tiger gone bad. Whispers trickled down the line as people realized what was going on. The tiger worked his way thru the pitiful foe, no annoyance to his regal self.

“If you would have shot him with that little BB gun of yours you would have just pissed him off and then He would have ate you. It takes a .50 Caliber to take ones of those guys down.”

“Thanks Sarge, are there lots of these things out here.”

“Nope, been here twice and that's the first one.”

Great, been here three days and I’ve been shot at, been in an airport attack and now I almost gotten eaten by a tiger. Wow. Hell of a three days so far.

“HEY, knock off the chatter. this ain’t no boy scout camp!”

At last as sleep finally overtook me bright lights and dirt seemed a curious mix to dream about. Bright lights flashing all around and dirt flying everywhere. Wait, this ain’t no dream. We were under attack! What the hell! What the hell do you do when mortar fire is exploding all around you. You duck. You cling to the earth like its a big sponge that can suck you in a save your young ass! Some one was yelling into the radio CEASE FIRE CEASE FIRE! What a crazy war. You can call up the bad guys and ask them to cease fire? NOT. We were calling our own guys and asking them not to blow us up. It seems our experience with the tiger had been heard by another patrol and they had sent out call for fire! Great job guys. Turns out later these guys are out of whack by a couple of mile and on the patrol back in the next day we meet them at the first turn and open fire on each other. Thank God we were all rookies and couldn’t hit the broadside of a barn yet. We formed into one big column and slowly walked back to base camp. It was about 10 am when we got back. This was March at the top end of the Mekong Delta. It was hot.

The monsoons hadn’t arrived yet.

I had been in country for four days and had been shot at, attacked, mortared, almost eaten by a tiger and shot at by my own guys. I was hot, dirty and stinky and there were no showers and drinking water only. I wondered over by an empty field and watch some crazy dozer pilot move dirt around with the biggest damn bull dozer I had ever seen. This guy was like dirt track racer. He could move that machine with such precision and skill it was a joy to behold. Some skinny redheaded kid with a southern accent sat down beside me and offered me a smoke. I took one out of the offered pack, lit it and drew in deep. I was the best damn pot I had ever tasted, rolled inside a Camel filter. By the time I had got to the end of that thing I was sitting there thinking, ”Hey, this ain’t so bad........................................” And so ended my first four days in ‘Nam. Little did I know what influence that little puff of smoke would have on my life, but that’s another story.

I was assigned to a maintenance outfit. They actually had a chemical squad. We repaired chemical equipment. All I really did while I was with them was work on a huge ugly Quonset hut that was destined to become the repair shop. Seems the 9^th Infantry hadn’t been here to long and they were building the place up like crazy. Shops and roads, Towers and bunkers....It was a frenzy of activity day and night. Somebody decided I was too smart or too dumb to repair equipment so they sent me off to the Headquarters tent. It was full of brass, officer brass, THE BRASS. The office handle all the supplies and the repairs of the entire 9^th Infantry. It was a busy place from 5 am in the morning to 10 pm or later, seven nights a week.

I was made the company librarian. Wow, it was cool. My library consisted of all the maintenance manuals for every piece of equipment the US Army owned. Well the job may have been cool but I wasn’t. As was to become my way and curse me thru most of my adult life I got everything organized in a couple of weeks and worked myself right out of a job! Damn, that made me eligible for KP, patrols and guard duty. Along with all that I got to keep tract of every piece of broken equipment owned by the 9th, every night, in triplicate. When will I ever learn...........

It was strange being in this office. Everyone was an officer, warrant officer or some kind of top

enlisted man. That left me and the other private as the gophers.....go for this....go for that......

go ...................yourself.

“Hunnel, get off your butt and get over to the motor pool and get your drivers license! Now! Move it.” the Sergeant Major politely requested of me. Cool, I was getting wheels. I ran all the way to the motor pool. There was a greasy Sergeant there who looked me up and down with disgust in his eyes. He hated us Headquarters wimps.

“Bring that Deuce over here.”

I walked over to the biggest damn truck I had ever tried to drive. It look about 40 feet tall. I scaled up the side of it like a mountain climber and settled in behind the biggest damn steering wheel I had ever wrapped my wimpy little fingers around. Starting seemed to be no problem. No key. Just an on and off switch and a floor starter like an old Model A. There seemed to be about fifty or sixty gears with about twelve levers sticking up out of the floor. Well, Here goes....

I fired the beast up. Hey, first time she fired right up. Great. Now if I could just figure out where first gear or any gear was. About ten minutes into my ordeal I looked up and saw that a crowd had gathered to watch my progress. Entertainment is cheap in ‘Nam I guess. They were laughing and slapping each other on the backs. I suppose that I was making more noise grinding gears and ramming the truck behind me than was considered appropriate. When I got the beast moving forward I got it figured out and after several trips around the motor pool I slid to a halt in front of the Motor Pool tent, shut her down, leaped out of the rig and walked over to the Sarge with a big grin on my face.

“Here’s you license. Now get back to headquarters. The Major is waiting for you.”

Now what did I do. My great mood dissolved off me like a hot April rain washing the mud off my face. I scurried back to headquarters to face the music. The Sergeant Major was waiting for me. He informed me I was taking the Major to Long Bien. His regular driver was sick and he needed to get there that day. I grabbed my helmet, flak vest, rifle, ammo, snack, cokes, smokes and headed back to Headquarters. There, waiting for me was ¼ ton with a trailer attached. I was going off the base camp. I was going...........oh who cares......I didn’t really know and I didn’t care. I was going. Inside were the Major and a Captain. Later that Captain and some other Captains and I would share many a bottle of whiskey. Seems like these guys were just regular working guys like me. Interesting, but that’s another story.

“Lets go!” barked the Major.

“Yes Sir!” I barked back.

I was not going to blow this job. Being a drive is a highly prized job. Even in a zone where they shoot at you. Well, nothing exciting happened on the way. We got there and drove around looking at this and that. Mostly I sat in the jeep while the Captain and the Major went into different building and tents around Long Bien. We finally put some stuff in the trailer and decided it was time to head back to Base Camp. Bear Cat. Home of the 9th. We were just leaving Long Bien as the sun was setting. All the roads were considered red or dangerous after dark. Our roads were yellow or red almost all the time. The Major look at me and asked, “How fast can you get us home, Hunnel?”

“Beats me, Sir. How far is it?”

“About twenty miles to the turn off and three down the dirt.”

“How does twenty minutes sound, Sir”

The Captain and the Major both looked at me like I was crazy. They didn’t even reply. It was either drive home or spend the night sleeping in some flea ridden transit tent. I put my foot to the floor and turned on the bright lights. Your suppose to drive about twenty-five MPH with those stupid little red lights on. I figured if I could see where I was going I could go faster and be a harder target to hit. The road was narrow, winding and bumpy.

I kept the petal to the metal and send us flying around curves and up short grades. Back then and for many years after I could keep a picture in my head of all the curves and bumps of all the roads I drove. I was just running the movie backwards and pretty much knew where we were. Once a shot rang out and some tracers flew over our heads. I didn’t stop of even slow down. I never took my eyes off the road. I had no idea what the gauges were saying nor did I care. The Major and the Captain were bounced around like a couple of rag doll GI Joes. I turned on to the dirt road that led to our camp and I knew we were almost home. I also knew this road was really dangerous so I slowed down and turned on the red security lights. Instantly the world went black. We could see squat.

“Hang On!” I yelled and hit the brights and floored that little jeep as fast as it could go. I snuck a look over at the Major. He was leaning way back in his seat with one hand on the windshield and the other on the dashboard. The Captain was sitting in the middle of the back seat with his rifle in one hand and this really strange look on his face like he was going to get car sick. I begin to giggle. Then I laughed out loud. Then the Captain laughed. Then the Major laughed. We were all having one hell of a jeep ride and we all knew it. I never did slow down. Not when I passed thru the front gate of the base camp with two MP’s trying to flag me over. Not when I skidded around several turns headed towards our camp. Certainly not when I turned toward the officer’s tent and brought the jeep into a six wheel drift and stopped the rig with the Major’s jeep door right next to the pallet sidewalk that led to the front door of his quarters.

“Where you from, Hunnel?”

“California, Sir.”

“That explains it. You’re one hell of a driver, Hunnel.”

From that moment on I was not only the Major’s personal driver but I was the driver for every officer in that office. It was a great job that lasted about four or five months. I think I clock over -50,000 miles and had a ball. Well, except for time my jeep floated away in the river but that another story!

3. Green Coffee

Green coffee is Army coffee. Right? Wrong! In our little office coffee was the drink of the day and night and always. We all took turns making coffee. I didn’t drink coffee. I hated coffee. The smell of it made my stomach queasy. Finally it was my turn to make coffee. Now, what’s the big deal about making a little coffee? You get to get up at 4 am so the coffee will be ready by 5 am. The coffee was made in a big boiler thing that looked like a small rocket ship. It made several gallons of coffee. Bad smelly coffee. A little evil light when off in my tiny brain and I said to myself, “Self, lets make sure this is the last time you make coffee!” Now this machine was a giant percolator type. It held at least two gallons of the ugly brown brew. I used the same grounds as the day before. I added just enough fresh grounds to cover the top of the coffee holder. Then I added two packs of green lime Kool Aide! Yum Yum!! I parked my self behind my little desk area and waited for the fun to begin. As the brass entered one by one they poured coffee in the dirty cups that never got washed and settled in for the day. There was a lot of grumbling, several comments about the smelly brew. The Sergeant Major walks in. Pours a cup of java. Spits it out all over the paper work in front of him and bellows, “Who the Hell made this poison?” Hunnel did came the group reply. “Hunnel, if you ever touch that coffee pot again I will send you to ‘Nam! Get it?!” Oh Yeah. Sweet. I never made coffee again. Well once I did, but that's another story......................................

Is it really a vacation if you steal a big truck and throw all your buddies in it and take off for the day? You Bet! ‘specially if your corporal is the one doing the stealing. I don’t know why we did it. After breakfast our corporal called about ten of us over to him and said, “Meet me by the motor pool in ten minutes. Bring your gear.” So we rounded up flak vests, helmets, rifles and ammo and headed toward the motor pool.

Off we went. In a big cloud of dust we headed down the dirt road to the Highway and then on to a small village just outside of Saigon. Water skiing on the Mekong River is not all it is cracked up to be. After consuming enormous amounts of beer and smoking like there was no tomorrow some of the braver or the more stupid went water skiing. Once it dawned on them they were moving targets for local target practice we put a stop to that. All in all the day was fun. Later that little village would completely disappear under the guns of the TET. But that’s another story.

It was our second year on the road as the Whiskey Creek String Band. It was summer and the living was easy. We were living in our house trucks and vans. Enjoying the life of the gypsy. We traveled from town to town, grange hall to grange hall, pub to pub. Somebody suggested we check out a new pizza place called the Copper Still. They were looking for bands that could perform without sound equipment. Whoa! Right up our alley. We made contact with the place. We played a few songs right then. The manager was tickled pink and hired us to come back every Thursday night for the next month. Cool. A regular gig was always a welcome addition to our somewhat spotty gig schedule. We showed up and about ten folks hung around and gave us a listen. Big Fiddlin’’ Sue played her fiddle, Coyote Bill sang his lonesome country songs and me, Uncle T, played the guitar, banjo and mandolin like picking was illegal and I was going to be busted any minute! Next week there were twice as many people. The week after that there were more! By the following week there was standing room only! Wow! We were so proud. Our usual deal was show up early for dinner. Play from 7 to 9. Collect a little dough and be on our way. So we show up for an early dinner. This place was really a show place. The ceilings were copper and all the paneling, doors and tables were real oak. The front doors were about three inches thick. The floors were oak and everything was polished and was just too dang pretty for words. While we were eating the boss came up and said, “I got to let you go!”

“ What?” What are you talking about? We build this from nothing to a packed house!”

That was the problem. The place was build as a corporate write off and needed to lose money for awhile!

So the boss says, “I’ll buy your dinners today. But we are done.”

“Whoa dude, I replied, We got tonight and next week on a contract with you” So if your looking for a loss, pay us our money and were out of here.”

“I will not pay you. Take me to court if you want but you ain’t getting a dime”

I was pissed. “I got nothing to due tonight and next Thursday so I will be back in about ten minutes with a thousand flyers and I’m going to stand outside your front doors and pass out posters to your customers telling them what an ass you are!”

With that I threw my linen napkin down in my plate marched to the front door. (Inside my tiny head I thought I’ll just kick these damn doors open! That will make me look tough, like a cowboy gone mad!!! I marched up to the door and launched myself in the air feet first and smacked into the door with all my weight!

The doors flexed their might oak muscles an withstood my assault like the cliffs against the sea. They bounced ever so slightly and threw me backwards about ten feet right on my back with my feet pointed up like a dead carcass drying in the sun! I was stunned. I looked at the doors. I looked at my feet. I looked at my band. Than I looked at the boss. I started to laugh, he laughed, the band laughed, the cooks and waiters laughed!!! I got up dusted myself off and pushed the door open and walked out to my house truck just shaking my head. Oh Well! Can’t win ‘em all. As we gathered our wits and were trying to decide where to go I saw the manager come out of the place and he was headed right for us. Now what? He handed me a check through the window. It was for the full amount owed!

“Why?” I asked.

“That was worth every cent!” he replied with a grin.

That wouldn’t be the last time we were in that part of Salem, Oregon. But that's another story.......

Once upon a time in McCall, Idaho we were playing in a little bar called the Miners Exchange. I should have know things would get funky by the sigh over the front door. It read

‘MINERSEXCHANGE”. It was a cute little place with a subterranean sort of feel to it. There was a nice crew of bartenders and waitress. They had a great happy hour that we often attended. We had played there several times over the last year and attendance to our shows had less people each time. We found out it wasn’t us but it was a local boycott due to whatever………. Anyway, the last time we played the bar was about $500.00 short of our pay. We took all the dollars, the quarters, the dimes and left the nickels and pennies. We were still about $200.00 short so we looked around the bar and said, “How much is the booze worth?”

“Take whatever.” said the barkeep.

We did. We went back to the condo and drank all the booze with the barkeep and the waitress. We had a good time. They had a good time. We left town the next day with hangovers and the barkeep and his girlfriend who ended up traveling with us for about a month. They actually got us a gig in Saint Mary’s Idaho but that’s another story.

Saint Mary’s is a little town nestled in the mountain near CorDeLane, Idaho. We had a couple of mishaps there. The first time we played there we opened up the equipment trunk and we had no microphones. We had left the on the stage in Bend, Oregon. Some local guy had some mics were could borrow and our good mics were shipped to us in a couple of days so it was no big deal. However, it did start what was to become known as the idiot check. From that point on, when we closed the bus doors and the van doors we always went back in to the club and looked all over the stage and the sound area to see if we left anything. Playing at Saint Mary’s was a hoot. We had great crowds and they loved our style of music.

When Mt. Saint Helens blew we were in Brookings Oregon. Our destination was Saint Mary’s. On the morning the volcano blew we headed north out of Brookings over to Interstate 5, then up and over the McKenzie to central Oregon. That’s when we begin to see the effects. The air was getting dark and dusty. Gray dust. Everywhere. By the time we headed North and East out of Bend the air was gray. We had to stop and buy dust masks. We put masks over the gas caps, the opening of the air cleaner on the engine and we keep them hanging off our necks. Every time a truck went by we had to wear the mask for about ten minutes. We had them on most of the next two days. As we got farther east we got into the real drift pattern of the explosion. The land turned gray. The buildings were gray. We were gray. Falling gray stuff filled the air and drifted up against the buildings like snow. We drove through small towns that looked like something out of science fiction movie. We tried to drive slow through the little towns. Our passing created wind storms that fouled the air. We were gritty, dirty and our skin felt like at had a coating of metal powder on it. The only thing that helped was beer. Lots of beer. We kept masks over our beer. It was hopeless, useless and pitiful.

We arrived in Saint Mary’s three days after the first blow. The volcano blew many times. The later blows were small but each time thousands of tons of dust blew out and drifted all over the surrounding area and especially to the west. We were right in it. We set up at the bar. We had built our stay from a two day weekend to four days a week. No one came. Everyone was dirty, dusty and depressed. On the forth day the owner came over and said, “I can’t pay you what I owe you. I called your agent and she said not to worry about the agent fee. So here is my offer. We took in $800.00 this week. I will split it right down the middle with you.” That seemed fair. There was five of us and five on staff. I said, “Ok, but one condition. We grab some beer and booze, shut this club down and go to the lake and PARTY!” Everyone agreed and we did just that. Big Sue drank a fifth of amoretto. She can not drink that to this day. We headed North into Washington and then up into Canada. We spend the next three months driving around in that dust and dirt. Volcanoes suck. We never did go back to Saint Mary’s but that’s another story.

In our travels as “The Whiskey Creek String Band” we often ran into friends or people that knew us because of our music everywhere we went. We were on our way to Revelstoke, B.C.. We had driven up the Slocan Valley, where draft dodgers for the last hundred years have hid out in, to the ferry point that crossed a huge lake. Revelstoke was on the other side of the lake. The lake took at least a whole day to drive around. As we approached the docked ferry the seaman waved on one car then the next, etc. He waved on Coyote’s ugly lime green van and than held his hand up to stop us. Whoa!!!!!!!!!! The seaman saw the look on our faces. He came up to our truck and said not to worry ‘cause they’ll be back in a couple of hours, eh. Cool. We got the day off and we’re sitting on a beautiful lake surrounded by dense evergreens and the air smelled like heaven. We got out to go sit on the hill. After a few hours we had quite a line of campers, cars and RV’s lined up for the next ferry ride.

Some cowboy looking senior and his wife approached us and said, “Hey, aren’t you Fiddlin’ Sue?”. Here we are in British Columbia, about 2,000 miles north of Fresno California and here is some guy from there that used to come see us. Well, one thing lead to another and out came the fiddle and the guitar and we had a little picnic concert kind of thing going on. It was fun, for awhile. After about five hours we grew a little concerned about the time. Where was the ferry? We figured that we may not be able to get to the gig if we don’t get across soon. We asked some locals about driving around the lake and they laughed and told us it would take all day and we would still be late. We got word somehow that the ferry had broke down and the way to us and a new ferry was coming from somewhere to make the pickup but it may no be until morning. Great! We were a union band in those days and missing the first night could void the contract and then we would be out of work for a week. It got dark and we started having thoughts about settling in for the night when in the distance we could hear the sound of big powerful motors churning their way threw the water coming in our direction. Oh boy, oh boy! We couldn’t make the gig in time but at least we would arrive that evening and maybe make amends with the hotel owner. We were staying and playing in the premier hotel of Revelstoke. When we arrived the Italian owner of the hotel greeted us, took us into the dining room and served us a great meal. He told us not to worry about the ferry or being late, that was part of life around here. We offered to prorate the week and he said that lets just see how things look at the end of the week. Cool. We must be in Heaven!

We had a great week. We meet lots of great folks and returned to Revelstoke many times in the coming months. The very next time we played in Revelstoke the weekly newspaper headlines read, “THE BEST DAMN FIDDLE MUSIC YOU’VE EVER HEARD!” It was a plug for our upcoming week. We learned to drink Prairie Fire in Revelstoke, but that’s another story!

In 1978 the Whiskey Creek String Band headed to Fresno California to make our first LP. Vinyl. Plastic. Wow, we were ready. We had been playing four to seven nights a week in bars, pubs, grange halls and the street. We recorded our LP on a little tape recorder over and over until we knew we could do each song in one take or less. We had made arrangements to record on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We set up a gig at the Olympic Tavern (now that’s really another story) for the weekends. Sue lost her voice and could only whisper for one month. We worked around that and did her vocals toward the end of the month. We had set aside a month for the record and everything went pretty much according to plan. We made a rule we would not record longer than three hours, that’s an old union rule, and would only go for three takes per song. I we could not get it in three takes we saved what we liked and came back later to finish. Its not as simple as it sounds ‘cause one take meant that each musician played their part by themselves. We often made two or three tracks of the same thing. We were real straight and professional for about one session and then we start drinking and getting high and it all seemed ok. Arrive at 7pm leave at 10pm. How wasted could you get? Besides we were young, stupid and strong. A little beer was not going to ruin the session. About two weeks into the adventure things were going well. I noticed that our producer, Bill Hunter of the Music Farmers, was always so wasted by the about half way thru the sessions that I started to watch him. He was drinking Gator Aide. Yet he was howling like the hillbilly he really was and getting all excited about everything. I sat down next to him to listen to Sue play her fiddle in the studio. The mixing room and the music room are two separate rooms and you can see the musicians through a big window. Bill says, “Hey Tom, want tah get a buzz on real fast?” “Sure”, says I. Bill gets a bottle of vodka out of his brief case and mixes it with a little Gator Aide. I slug it down. I am stone cold drunk in about a minute. I actually get a rush of the booze. I had know idea! Well, Bill and I got drunk. I have no idea what happened the rest of the night. I think that might have been the night we went out to Bill’s house and composed that back cover to our first LP. Whisky Creek, On The Rocks! But, that’s another story.

As we traveled back and forth across the Canadian border we were always careful to have our ducks in a row. Work visa, papers for the dogs and birds (yes, we traveled with cockatiels) equipment roster, ID cards, guns, ammo and we made sure that we did not have any pot with us ‘cause that was bad news. We use to round up all the pot and put in a jar and bury it on this side of the border so we could have some for the ride home. Of course, we would forget where we buried it and would go crazy looking under rocks and trees and …..you get the idea. So between 1979 and 1983 we made many trips back and forth. We were search a number of times. The Canadians were always real nice and the Americans were always rude and mean. I have lots of Canadian stories but this one is about a fat little green bud that I had stashed inside a set of guitar strings, inside a plastic wrap, inside a old mic case that I kept my strings in. I found it many years after our trips were over. I could not believe that I had smuggled that little bud back and forth across the border for so many years. I knew I had it for a long time because it was in an Earthwood wrapper. I had used EarthWood strings from 1975 to about 1985 when I switched to another brand. Somebody was watching out for me. Thanks, whoever you are!

The Army uses a device that is called an emersion heater to heat water in the field. it’s a little gas burner that had a long chimney attached to it. You set it down inside a water barrel after you get it going and it heats water pretty fast and pretty hot. Our mess Sarge was a clever individual and got great joy out of trading and bartering. Somehow he managed to get a big steel water tank that held about 300 gallons. In fact, he got two of them. We build a tower. Stole a crane from the engineers next door and set the tanks on top of the towers. After about a week of cold showers, welcome but not all that much, somebody said, “Hey, lets put a heater in it!” Wow, what an idea. We did. It worked. We refined the idea by putting a heater in one and using it as the hot water and leaving the other as a cold tank. We came up with that ideas ‘cause we burned our butts when we left the heaters in both tanks all day!!! Ouch. A little plumbing and a little ingenuity and we had HOT SHOWERS!! Dang, it was like we died and went to heaven. One day our new captain was getting to know us. He decided to crack down on us and whip us in to shape. Hey, we’re in ‘Nam. Get real. Well, the hot showers vanished. We did only what was required. Word got back to the new captain and he decided that it was OK if some of us did what ever the heck we wanted to as long as the real work got done. The price. Hot Showers. That left us time for important stuff like swimming in the back of our water trucks and drinking Cold Duck, but that’s another story.

In January of 1989 I got my first job as a tax preparer. He was a retired fellow. Kind. Put up with my mumblings and bumblings. After much help from my boss I got his tax return done. He had sold a rental property that he had owned for many years and he thought that he really had not made much on the sale. He forgot about the depreciation. You have to claim back the depreciation when you sell a business property. He left with about a $12,000.00 tax bill. I continued with my appointments. About an hour later a young fellow and his wife stopped by and inquired about their dad. Seems he had an appointment earlier that day. We figured out who it was and I told them that he had left several hours earlier. They found him in his truck, slumped over the steering wheel of this truck. DEAD! I always will wonder if the news I gave him killed him. Maybe his time had come and our paths were just intertwined in the great scheme of things. Hummmmm

We use to swim in our water truck in ‘Nam. Nothing like it. A big old water tank mounted on the back of a truck filled with 500 gallons of cool water. Never mind that the water may end up as drinking or cooking water. Every so often we had to open the hatch to the water tank, slid in every so carefully and sit at the bottom of the tank for as long as we could hold our breath. Only a few privileged individuals were able to partake in this ritual. One night we were getting drunk and playing ping pong in our little night club we had built. It was about 9 or 10pm. A new guy showed up at the door and asked if he was at the right place. We said, “You bet. Come on in a have a cold beer. Play some ping pong. Have a smoke! Somewhere around midnight we decided we were all hot and sticky so we would go swimming in the truck. One by one we slid into the cool darkness of the water. There was just enough water to allow us to surface inside the tank. Beer arrived. We got drunker. Time to climb out. The new guy slipped on the wet truck deck and smacked down to the deck with a bang and a thud. He split his head open pretty good so we bagged him up and drove him to the medic tent, dropped him off and totally forgot about him. Not only did we not remember him, he had no idea where he was or what happened. He had no orders, clothes or anything with him accept his clothes on his back. When asked what unit he was assigned to he had no idea. We never saw him again. I guess he got reassigned. The mail clerk came around about a week later with some mail for the guy but we had no idea who he was, where he was or where he went! About a month later he came back to our little night club and after chatting a bit we put the bits and pieces together and had a good laugh over that and we all went swimming again.

But we did play ping pong. Lots of ping pong. Epic ping pong battles between me and Schwartz, but that’s another story!

One of my first year tax clients was a young fellow that sat down and handed me a court order saying he had to claim $30,000.00 worth of income for the Pot he had been busted with. Seems he got caught with a grow room. This was back in 1988 so things like that were bad news. Oh yeah! So, anyway, I says to him, “You ought to write of the cost of the rent and utilities to offset the income!” He looked at me like I was crazy and said, “Oh, I think I will just leave the income the way it is. I don’t want to piss them off anymore than they are!”. Funny thing is that it would have been legal, sort of, to use the costs of the operation to reduce the income!!!

The title is longer than the story but now that I got yer attention here’s the tail of serious drinking combined with or without burritos served by David, the gypsy burrito cook. The incident took place at the Farge Inn, in Newpot, Orygun. It was about 1976. A dark and stormy fall night. Street hustling had moved pretty much indoors. We were scoring some grange hall and community center gigs. Clubs were beginning to let us bring in our PA system. The Inn was pretty small and we just stood in the middle of the room and pretty much filled it with our singing and picking. Folks danced and drank, yelled and screamed, laughed and laughed. It was a good feeling. David, the gypsy cook, had prepared plenty of burritos, some with and some without mushrooms. All of us and all of the locals knew what that meant. We had already done this thing a couple of times and it was really fun. This was about the third time. Word was out. The place was packed to the rafters. Everyone smoked in those days and the smoke hung heavy in the bar. The bar room lights looked like the warning lights at the end of the break water on a foggy day.

You could just feel reality begin to slip away about midnight. Everyday folks walking by had dropped in and order a beer and some of them burritos. David the Gypsy Cook was to far gone to remember what had what and everyone got everything, if you know what I mean.

A drunk stood up on a chair and yelled at Fiddlin Sue and said he would break her fiddle over her head if she didn’t stop playing. The crowd hushed. They looked at Sue. They looked at the guy. In one loud voice they yelled Noooooooooo! And moved toward him. I felt like I was somewhere between a Felini movie and a bad B grade tale of pirates, gladiators and hippies in bar fights and by golly I thought one was just about to break out! UP Steps this little gal about 5 foot tall. She grabs him by his ear and gives it a might twist. Yanking him forward and out to the front sidewalk and down the alley where she beat the dickens out of him. Turns out that was his wife. She really like our band and she was a martial arts expert. They came back in a little later, he had a black eye, apologized to Sue. Promised never to be an ass again. Poor guy. Felt sorry for him.

But while he was out in the alley getting his butt kicked Jon Thomas decided that if that son of a bitch game back in the bar he would kick his butt. He took a big swing to show how hey would take the guy out. Jon Thomas, “The Fisherman”, could drink a lot and he was setting a record that night. He swung so hard he spun himself around and fell into the Popcorn Machine. He jumped back and screamed at the Popcorn Machine and with a mighty swing crashed the machine to the wall. The Popcorn Machine bounced off the wall with a mighty thump and careened into Jon Thomas head with an ugly thud. Jon reeled backwards about ten feet, rolled his eyes up to the light and down he went. With a mighty crash he fell to the floor. Just then is when the first guy and his wife came back in the bar. Jon Thomas was a forgotten soul. His drunken body lay on the floor and people just stepped over him. By now it was apparent even to us that having 150 people in a tavern meant for thirty was not a smart idea. We packed up and left.

The next time we were suppose to play there the owner had the door locked. We knocked on the door, it opened with a creak, a pale hand held out a plain white envelope and whispered, “Just take the money and go away!” We took the money and went down to the Gray Haven Tavern and spend it on drinks for the gang. We played there instead. Made a little dough. Newpot was always good to us. Now there are lots of stories about Newpot. But that’s another story…..

We used to hang out in a tavern called the Olympic Tavern. We all called it The Oly. Sue and I ran an open mic there that in short time became so popular that we expanded the show for one more day. We encourage people to get together in different combinations and work up 20 minutes of time. We changed the acts every half hour. Many times, we ran it right up until 2am when we had to close. Sue and I got Six Bucks each for running the show. Of course, we got all the beer we could drink. When John the Bartender had to “take a break”, I would take over. I knew I had the taps for at least twenty minutes. Everyone what storm the bar like a drunken thirsty mob and I would refill all the glasses and pitchers as fast as I could. I think John knew but he never said a word. As one young musician was playing something, folkie he stopped and asked for a beer. The bartender asked him did he want anything else? “Yeah,” the kid says, “How about some money.” John yells across the bar and says get it from Tom. The bar laughed and I yelled out, “Hey, all I get is Six Bucks!”

With that, a light went off in my head and I wrote the following words.

Unionize Socialize Rehab possibility wise

Ah shit, I’m just trying to make a buck.

The man behind the bar says,

“What do you want more money for? Everyone else who works gets a decent wage.”

And I say “how much?”

He says, “Six Bucks”

Six Bucks in cash each night

Six buck take it home it’s all right

Six bucks for you and your wife and

Your dog and your cat and your strings and you lawyer and your agent hot dogs, gasoline, taxes, chicken necks shoes socks etc etc etc. etc etc ……………………………….............

Sometimes a song or a thought comes to you so quick and easy it takes your breath away. Other times I can go years without a thought in my head. Or so it seems at times. Sometimes I don’t think at all but that’s another story!

We used to take our fiddles to Schubachs in Portland to get fixed up. They worked on classical instruments only. The liked Sue’s story about her fiddles and for what ever reason they took us in like we were royalty. After a few visits they gave us the grand tour and showed us all the priceless instruments they were repairing and making. When the moved from downtown to across the river the ended up on a very busy corner. We were on our way north to Canada for a few months so we left one of Sues fiddles at the shop to get a new finger board put on. When we got from back from Canada we went to the shop to get the fiddle. As the fiddle was handed to Sue the luthier said to Sue is that there was no charge for the repair. We asked why and were told that a truck had crashed through the outer wall and came right into the repair shop destroying and damaging thousands of dollars worth of valuable classical instruments. But, right in the middle of the opposite wall they found Sue’s fiddle. Not a scratch on it and perfectly in tune. Funny thing is that is not where the repair guy had left it. It was on the other wall sitting on the work bench. That means it flew across the room from the truck impact into the wall it was sitting on to the bench on the opposite wall! Now, that’s some magic. Sue’s Fidel and Farris were made by her grandpa but that’s another story.

The first year on the road, 1975, Sue and I saw the same crows over and over. It was a pair of really big crows. Not as big as a raven but a big fat health crow. We knew it was the same pair because one of them had a peculiar wing pattern on it left wing. It was kind a jagged with a distinct shape. We saw these crows in Newport. We would drive all the way to Mt Hood and we would see them there. We would drive down through the back roads from Mt Hood all the way to Eugene. Sure enough, they would show up where ever we stopped. I think it was some powerful spirits sent to protect us. Sue figured it was her Dad and maybe her Grandma. I figured she was plumb crazy but I would learn in the years to come Sue was always right in her predictions but, Hey! That’s another story.

That same year we had a great summer. We worked mostly buskin. We had a tight little act and we did have a small PA system that we could use in clubs. We traveled with a bonified nut named Billy Walsh. Billy used Kare as his last name. So we were Billy Kare and the Whiskey Creek String Band. We had a Sign made with that and when Billy left the band we cut that off the sign and handed it to him. But, that’s another story. This story is about a warm summer day. It had rained for several days and we awoke to a wonderful sunny morning. We were up in the mountains near ZigZag Oregon at a campground named Horseshoe Camp. It was free and the living was easy. We got all the sleeping bags, blankets and pillows and hung them up in the sunshine to cook all the day in the solar waves. Billy was making breakfast and Sue and I decided we would head to the creek and let the dogs take a dip. On the way to the creek Sue and the little wiener dog, Buckwheat, stepped on a Yellow Jacket nest. The critters stormed out of the hole in the ground like a tornado gone wild. They swirled around Sue and Bucky. I could wipe them off the back of Bucky and they didn’t bite me. They also ignored Uriah, my big dog. Sue ran to the creek and jumped in but it was only six inches deep. I yelled run run run. We all ran like crazy! You can outrun a swarm. You have to run full speed for about one and a half miles. As the bugs dropped off us, we continued to run and swat as fast as we could. By now, Sue was ripping off her clothing and screaming like crazy. I was running behind her yelling at the top of my lungs RUN RUN RUN!!!! I wish I had a picture of the look on Billy’s face when we ran into camp. The other campers were also staring at us. I yelled, “Bees on the way. Get in the Camper now!” As we close the door of the camper, we could hear the bees pounding against the door and the windows. We all stared at each other and then burst out laughing. Talk about a rush. I was buzzed for hours after that. As the day wore on and the clouds rolled in we sat through a three day ran storm was like the beginning of The Flood. To this day I swear we taught Bucky how to say raison. Rrrrrrrrrrraaaaaasssssssnnnnnn. She would look up at us and say that and we would fall over laughing. Bucky was a very special dog that I had inadvertently had owned her great grandma, her grandma and her ma. Through selective breeding, guided by herbs and magic potions Bucky was molded into the one and only dog for Sue. She was a magic dog but, as you know by now, that’s another story!

We traveled through the Eastern Oregon and Southern Washington Area for about two years. During that time we moved our big JBL speaker cabinets in and out of many a night club and dances. Now either we had a lot of mice everywhere we went or we had a mouse living in our speaker box. For months, the mouse would come out about midnight and scamper around then go back in the box. We never said anything to the nightclub owners. I think he or she finally jumped ship in John Day, Oregon. They had some pretty good chow there! But that a yeah yeah yeah, another story.

Our first year on the road we thought we were singing harmony to Billy Kare. I don’t know if we were but were getting close. When we came back to Fresno, Ca in the winter of 1975-76 we joined back up with Coyote Bill who was one of the original members that couldn’t go on the road that first year. Well, Bill was ready to sing and play. We got a gig at a place called the Water Tree Inn. After the first set the bar manager said he wanted us five days a week. Wednesday through Saturday were gigs and Sunday was the jam as was the custom in those days. Now this managers name was Floyd and he had been somewhat of a rock star in the late fifties. He wrote a couple of hits and got tied up with some interesting people and they were all running this hotel in Fresno. Floyd says, “Here’s the deal. You work for free. You get two rooms, free run of the hotel including the bar and the kitchen. If you need something you come and I will get it for you. If I ever tell you its time to leave, you get all your gear and belongings and get off the property ASAP!”

A strange request but we figured what the heck. Free food, free drinks and free music lessons. The proposition sounded pretty good to two hippies living in a house truck in Fresno! So we got our rooms, ate our food. Played our music. Soon it became apparent that we we’re playing with some rough characters. They were always nice to us but-they carried guns. Now most of my friends in those days had guns but they didn’t pack them around hidden in their suit coats. I have always been an insomniac. When I was younger I would run at night or combination run and walk for miles. I would get off work at 2am. Sue and I would go to our room and then I would go for a jog. There was a lot of strange stuff going on in that Hotel and Restaurant. The crowds grew in numbers and we became a hang out for the pickin’ and grinning’ crowd of Fresno. One day Floyd was passing us by in the parking lot and he casually said, “Its time to go.” We did and we never went back.  Well, sort of..But that's another story.

We were in Portland at the Lewis and Clark College. Out behind the buildings was a large common area that had acres of terraced lawns. We set up on the upper area and pointed are speakers out over the area that was about half the size of a football field and was about 8 feet lower than us. It was some kind of holiday or special day….I don’t know which. Lots of people were milling around watching us set up and then listening when we first started. We began to draw a crowd. Soon we had folks dancing and laughing. More people came. More people to have fun with! Someone asked us if we could call any squares or reels. So we set them up for a simple form of the Virginia Reel. Columns of two opposite your partner. Thing is we had about thirty columns that were about 100 deep. That’s a lot of people. We began to play and play and play. Song after song. Bow to your partner, Right had swing, left hand swing, dosey doe. On and on we went. Everyone in every column got to be the head couple. Even Sue Reger never had such a big crowd but, hey, that’s another story.

22 miles outside of Fresno, headed north towards Yosemite, is a small road side pub called The 22 Miles House. On any given Saturday or Sunday at least 50 to 100 Hogs were parked around the place. Headed out of Fresno towards the mountains Sue and I drive by and pull into the 22 Mile House. It’s on a windswept hill at the start of the foot hills leading out of Fresno towards Yosemite. In the late ‘70’s there was nothing else around for 10 miles in any direction. Why would we walk into a crowd of about 100+ Bikers? For Fun! We had our guitar and our fiddle. We settled into a tall cold Beer Tini, the house drink, met the locals, played music, smoked dope and had a damn good time. Anytime after that we could stop into the 22 Mile House and never pay for a thing. I wonder whatever happened to that place………………

In the early 1990’s we opened for Leon Russell at the PAC in Newport Oregon. Our Daughter was about three and his daughter was about 2 ½. The girls took a liking to one another. They showed each other the RV’s and the Buses. The girls ran around backstage like a couple of banshees infecting our laugh quota with a maximum overload. We had got there a bit early and Leon was already there. It turned out to be a good time. Leon’s group of people were all happy and so were we. I guess that was because it was early December and Christmas was just weeks away. When we played we made jokes about Leon and He yelled back at us from the sidelines. When we play “Rollin’ in My Sweet Babies Arms” he came out and sang a verse. You know, all during the day my daughter kept asking me if Leon was Santa! I told her, “Yeah, Honey. Santa is really a musician and just does the Christmas thing to pay the bills!” But of course, that’s another story!

Sound at the WOW in the late 70’s and the early 80’s was a nightmare. If you didn’t have your own sound you had to find some band that was in off the road and not working so you could have sound there. The Hall it self had a list of such bands. There wasn’t much in the way of “Soundmen” yet. I had a bunch of speakers, a twelve channel mixer (big for those days!), cables, mics, monitors and all that stuff. We even had a funky light system built by Cap”in Kirk of Juggling Fame. He was our sound guy for a while but , hey, that’s another story. So…….I would combine my system with Dick Gunn’s system. He had about the same set up and somehow we would mate the systems together into a quagmire of wires and plugs and connectors and god knows what else! We ended up with a pretty good main stack and 4 to 6 monitors on the stage. Two mixers mated together to a bunch of cabling that ran from the stage straight back overhead to the mixer platform. The mixer platform was really just a space cleared out at the back of the bleachers. After we would get everything plugged in we would race to see who could consume the most beer and pot before the bands would start. Once the crowd got there Dick would go downstairs and bring us beer back to the mixer area. We would drink and laugh and make fun of the awful music on stage. Dick and I were into Western Swing, Bluegrass and fiddles. The rock bands with awful equipment can only be louder. You can’t make them sound better. Sometimes the bands were so bad Dick and I would stick cigarettes in our ears to work like ear plugs. We wouldn’t break the tips off. We would just let them stick out like little white antennas. People would ask if we could hear the music and we would yell back at them and yell, I CAN’T HEAR YOU. THE MUSIC IS TO LOUD!”. Then we would laugh like banshees and fall back in our chairs laughing. I ran a background tape called “Everyone’s fucking but me” in the background music and no one ever noticed. We had some fun nights too. One night a Dead clone band played and the Lesans brought their real light equipment like you would get at the Fillmore or Winterland. Ancient spinning wheels of light and plates of colors baking under lights and projected over every changing images of Monty Python, like on steroids. The music peaked, the sound was great, the lights were from the great beyond and the crowd was stoned….. WOW. That’s why they call it the WOW Hall. Now they got great sound and lights and great people running the place. Hang in there……We love the Wow!

There were many signs of the snow storms coming our way but we weren’t smart ‘nough to see them. Scary Winter ice and snow storms. We left Eugene Oregon in January of 1978 and headed out to Bend and then to John Day, Idaho City, McCall, St Mary’s, then across the Canadian Border to some wind blown god forsaken hotel some where by the Alberta Border. Guess what happened next! As we came across the border we were stopped by stern looking men wearing white shirts, black military ties fastened down, black commando style pants with knee high gloss black boots. Top that off with bandoliers of ammo and Thompson style machine guns. The dragged us out of our trucks and took us out back and shot us!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! NO! WAIT!! That’s a dream I had over and over. We got through that after about and hour of them screwing around with our heads. We figured out later that was the day the Iranian students grabbed the English and American and Australian? Don’t quote me here but you get the picture.

Back into the Northern tip of Idaho. God, what a sight to see. One time we were leaving out of West Yellowstone bound south and for Casper, Wyoming. It was the year that there was a total eclipse of the Sun in the late morning. We were bound south through the forest area at the south of Yellowstone and watched the shadow race up and over us. The change in the light on the snow was just a sight. A black and white Fellini carnival. Shadows of fox and wolf dancing in Venetian masks just out of sight and then gone like smoke in the wind. I guess that was one of the signs. Mind you now. We still have not driven on pavement. Its March by now and we headed down to Pocatello, We played at the Idaho Bar in east Pocatello. We had a great time and met a group of farmer biker types. The sun broke out and melted the snow. By Sunday we were done with the gig and went over to the farm. Bar-B-Que, sunshine, volley ball. We partied until sundown and headed straight north over the divide into the worst damn store I’d seen in a long time. Our windows froze up. Each wiper had a little chip of ice scrapping a little clear spot on the windshield. We were following the lights in front of us. If Bill would have gone off the road we would have been right behind him. Some where up ahead we spotted a soft florescent glow. We were only going about 15 mph by then so we stuck our heads out the window and saw that the glow was a gas station. It was closed but it was shelter! We parked the house truck into the wind in the first lane and Bill pulled in tight behind us. We all climbed in the back of the house truck and got stoned and laughed like loons. While we were having fun the storm actually blew out and we drove on to our destination. We were back in the snow until May. Whiskey Creek played on the road for nine years. California, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, South Dakota, Montana, British Columbia and Alberta. You like snow! Try that route out. Leave Dec 15^th and get back by March 15^th. We actually had our band bus towed by a SnowKat to a Canadian lodge. They parked us by the back door. We lived in the bus and played in the lounge and it was cold and fun! One of the rooms that Johnny stayed in actually had snow piled up by the door. ON THE INSIDE!

Some of the winters all run together. I kind of guess at the time based on the vehicle we were living in. If we were in the House Truck, Gus, then it would have been 1975 to 1981. The Bus would have been 1981 to 1988. We quit doing road things by 1985 but used the bus for local or country parties and gigs. It carried lots of stuff and ten or fifteen people could party in it. A convenient opium den for the pot heads. Kids were appearing in our lives and things were getting freaky! But Hey, that’s another story.