We went to San Francisco and visited Rudy. He showed us a nanogolf course that he built.
We went to the park by Crissy Field. The city has made it more natural, more of a wetland, it's pretty, and always exciting to see out over the busy bay. There were lots of para sailboarders. Kiteboarders?
Slug dug.
The strong wind sculpted class four gnarly compuations into the sand.
Then we went to see a concert at the Fox Theatre in Redwood City. One of the groups was Charlie Musselwhite and his Sanctuary band.
I’m a fan of Charlie’s from way back, I first saw him when I was in college. He came to our student party back then and I even talked to him a bit there — this was like forty years ago. At the time it made a huge impression on me, I was so thrilled to be talking with a Famous Entertainer and True Artist. Also a Blues Man.
Another time, in the mid 1970s, I happened to be staying up all night, and I listened to Charlie's album Louisiana Fog about a dozen times. To this day, some of those songs are etched for instant access in my memory. The brain codec. “Fell Down On My Knees,” comes to mind.
Charlie recently put out a great new album called Sanctuary, which I got from Rudy for Xmas. So in the lobby after the show, when Charlie is selling and signing CDs, I tell him I already got one for Xmas, but give him a piece of paper to sign anyway — which he isn’t all that happy about, given that the point of this exercise for him is to sell albums. He had a special home-made album for sale too, which I hadn’t realized, I probably should have gotten one of those. So here’s my big moment with the Hero Of My Youth, and I’m like, “I met you at Swarthmore College in 1966.” “Funny, I don’t remember that,” says Charlie in his Elvis-like voice, tinged with a bit of sarcasm I imagine, and moves onto his next petitioner. Oh well! It was a great concert.