Cowboy up... y'all ~ The Americana Kitsch and Cutlure Tour

Cowboy up... y'all 

~ The Americana Kitsch and Culture Tour

~ originally posted 5 Jul 2011

Howdy MM's, Firstly, my apologies for the tardy state of this blog... I lost days, they wandered off into the ethers somewhere... Then I was ill and feeling icky...but am back on board now... So, this week Aaron and I bought cowboy hats... What's scary about this purchase, is that we love them! And Aaron's hat looks fantastic on him! So, have we come over to the dark side...i.e. Dollyland here we come. No, we've just been in the home of country music—Nashville, Tennessee. Despite loathing country music—we had a ball in this city. And it's not as country as it used to be.   When we bought Aaron's cowboy hat, we said to the women in the shop. "Do people really wear these out here?" She said, "Oh yes, you'll see a few people." To which I said, "I will come back and personally kill you with my bare hands if we are the only ones wearing cowboy hats out tonight." We all had a giggle over that. And she's still alive, despite there not being THAT many people actually wearing them out to places. We didn't care; we had fun in them anyway.   Tennessee is a wide narrow state and we amble across from East to West. We instantly notice the change in energy as we come into the State of Tennessee. We are in the South again and it's sooooo nice. People take life slower, things amble more, people are friendlier. It works for us. We stop in Lynchburg, TN at Jack Daniels Distillery. It's a pretty wee spot at the distillery but the wee town of Lynchburg itself has too much biker energy for my liking. It makes my skin crawl. Ugh. Jack Daniels itself is a Tennessee Whiskey—not Bourbon. It is called that very specifically on the bottle. Even though most people call it Bourbon, it's not 'officially' one because of the way it's made. To be classified as Bourbon you must have at least 51% corn in the mash, which the Kentucky Bourbons do have.   The man who started Jack Daniels was a man known around these parts as 'Mr. Jack'—a rather dapper gentlemen, dressed in very fine clothes which some thought might have made up for his height...or lack of it. He was only 5ft 2ins tall. At the age of 7, Jack went to live with a lay preacher Dan Call who ran a still. The preacher taught him the art of how to make the whiskey and when Jack was 13, he bought the still from the preacher. This came about because a temperance woman convinced Dan that religion and booze did not mix and Mr Jack never looked back.   Jack Daniels is different to Bourbons too in that it is filtered through layers of charcoal, literally drop by drop. All the charcoal is made on the premises by firing pallets of sugar maple wood and reducing them to charcoal.   The source of water supply comes from an underground cavern and spring right there on the property. It is limestone water and iron free, which is what you need to make bourbon or whiskey.  We got to see the original office that Mr Jack worked from and could take pictures in there but not in the distillery itself. It was not like Kentucky where we got to shoot everything. We thought there was a slightly more aggressive attitude here than Kentucky. More 'roughhouse'—can't really explain it. More 'cowboy' maybe. In the office, is the original safe that money and paperwork was kept in overnight. Every morning, Mr Jack would come to work and his office manager would be waiting for him with the safe opened for the day. He came into the office one morning before his office manager had arrived, and couldn't get the safe open. Finally in frustration, he kicked it (as you do) and broke his toe. This led to gangrene, and eventually his demise. Jack, who had no direct descendants, left his distillery to his nephew Lem Motlow, which is the name you see on the bottle as proprietor these days.          I was looking for the 'old guys.' Jack Daniels used to run a very successful ad campaign in New Zealand, which showed a couple of old guys sitting around playing checkers and passing the time of day. The whole premise of their ad was that there was nothing much else to do once the whiskey was made but wait. That was the secret in their process. Good whiskey can't be hurried.   What's interesting about this wee town is that it's dry. That means you can't even BUY the famous whiskey here at the distillery! But hang on; they have a loophole law made in the 90's that now allows JD to sell 'collector' bottles of the whiskey. There aren't enough people in the township to put to a vote to overthrow this archaic ruling. So, the town remains dry.   We walked into the small town of Lynchburg afterwards. We saw a couple of guys in the rocking chairs... So, they kind of did for my 'old codgers.' But the whole town had a slightly scruffy groddy feeling to it. Lots of biker energy, which JD seems to attract. I did not enjoy it at all. I was glad to get out of there.         We then carried on to Nashville itself and parked up for the next few days.  Our first morning there, Aaron was waiting to get the shuttle bus into town to pick up the rental car. A man comes into the office and says hello as a general greeting. Aaron said back to him, "Hello Wayne." Double take on Waynes part. It turns out the CEO of Smith and Smith Glass is here on holiday with some other kiwi friends in their RV and Aaron used to work for him. The world is very small when you're a kiwi sometimes. :-) Once Aaron gets the car, we set off for the Antebellum Trail. Think big old southern houses with columns! (and money and slaves...) Our first stop is Rippavilla, a beautiful old Greek columned house. Two storied, with big airy elegant rooms on each level. The ceilings are 12 foot high downstairs and 14 foot high upstairs. My kind of place. You can imagine drinking mint julep here on the back balcony, catching whiffs of breeze, whiling away an afternoon... Very southern and genteel.   The house itself has been nicely restored and is not overly stuffed with fussy French furniture that people tended to favor back then. They have carpets throughout that are an old pattern from the 1800's and also reproduction wallpaper of that time. It's very rich, ornate and decorative. A sun room was added and is full of white wicker furniture and cool tiled floors... I want one instantly. Of course, all this romantic living, was backed by a not so romantic background. These big plantation houses usually had their complement of slaves and were wealthy enough (really) to pay wages. It's a hard moral dilemma I have between my love of plantation houses and what kept them running. We leave the house and drive down a very long gravel road to see the one slave cabin, they have left standing. It's very small and a long distance from the big house. I guess people did not necessarily want to see the help if it could be helped. Or be reminded on a soul level perhaps of what people were living in, and what they themselves were living in. The cabin has one window and a door. It now has vultures living in it. Somehow this seems appropriate.       We leave there and go to the town of Franklin to the Carter House. This, like Rippavilla, was a house along the Civil War Trail that was of note. It was commandeered. Had important meetings here. And a LOT of fighting happened here. I am not very keen on it. It has weird energy. I am eager to leave here. The house itself is not very notable. It is plain red brick and not particularly big. The back porch walls still have zillions of bullet holes in them. As Lu said, some poly filler wouldn't go a miss. Yes, I know. But you would think that over the years before it become a National Landmark House, and no one really cared one way or the other about the house, that someone would have gone. Good lord, those bullet holes are unsightly—I must get some Spackle and fill them in!         Of course, now they are historic and interesting. To say that I cannot really connect to the Civil War stuff is an understatement. But the South take their Civil War very seriously, so I try to take SOME interest. Also Aaron hasn't had any more of the very strange energy he had in Virginia but does have the odd good flash with stuff. We think it might have been a past life, possibly in the Civil War. I can see a hat. I can't quite get a color right. It's grey, well... sort of blue, but grey. It's not blue blue. Clear non? It's got a black band across the front part. And has two crossed ??? somethings. I can't describe them. They are like two metal thingees, that are crossed and on the front of the hat. I think they might be confederate but aren't the flag. I am at sea. I don't know what I am seeing.  Later, Chuck, the guy at Rippavilla shows us pictures and we see a replica hat. I realize why the color eluded me. It's a grey/blue but not blue blue—like a navy. Also, there is the black band. And the crossed metal thingees on the front are rifles. Ahhhh. Confirmation is always nice. But even Aaron is not overly invested in the Civil War stuff, so we don't really know what it all goes with. We finally leave there and I am relieved. It is not the Antebellum, mint juleps on the lawn place I was hoping to see.   So, we take a slight detour and go and glimpse Carnton House, just up the road. This was used as a hospital during THE war. THE war —of course is the Civil War! They have long memories here in the south. It has funny energy too. Someone tells me they did lots of amputations here. I realize I am very glad we got here too late to go inside and tour it. Eek.   I am glad we went to see Rippavilla Plantation because that is what I expect an Antebellum house to be like. :-) We then head back to the RV Park and go and have some drinks with the fellow kiwis. It is very nice and we get to admire Debbie and Matts RV, which has the push out sides and a full bathroom—with—a washer/dryer! Wow...isn't that just fantastic. As well, as a side by side fridge/freezer with ice maker! I am green with envy. We are MUCH clearer on what the next camper will be now! We also find out that we don't need special class licenses to drive these bus like campers. Hmmmmm, we say. We are not moving quite as fast the next day, for some reason... and it's sooooo hot and muggy. It gets pretty steamy down here in the summer. Not only is the air temperature hot, but the humidity is right up there with a steam bath. Our first stop of the day is Cooters Garage. Ringing any bells... General Lee—THE General Lee, Daisy, The Duke brothers... Yes, Hazzard County, right here in Tennessee. Not as exciting as the Waltons but still fun to see a blast from the past. That covered the Kitsch part of the day for sure. LOL.   We marvel at how tight the jeans were worn back then. Crikey! How short Daisy Dukes shorts were...and how many General Lee's they must have wrecked making this show. Also, that we all loved it so much when it was on! And no wonder, people think Southerners are as dumb as a box of rocks. These shows were pretty um...well...put it this way, time provides a perspective that makes things interesting.   We leave there and go to Cheekwood Estate to go to lunch there at the Pineapple Room. This is advertised as a 'ladies who lunch place...' but doesn't quite hit the mark. It's more like yummy mummies and their little 'darlings.' And it goes downhill from there... In its defense, I will say —the Fried Green Tomatoes were EXCELLENT. The right amount of breading, goats cheese, bacon bits and chutney...omigod...we do love our FGT's.   Okay, never mind, next. It's steamy hot, Aaron is muttering about shopping. I'm thinking about the pool at the RV park—seriously! We decide to stop anyway and see Nashvilles answer to the Parthenon! Build for the World Expo, it was completed in 1897 in plaster, wood and brick. And later in the 20's it was made into a more permanent structure in concrete. Nashville is known as the 'Athens of the South'—so buildings for this expo were built with this in mind. Which explains why they also had a great pyramid built—not. But anyway...despite it sounding a bit hokey, it turns out to be a rather magnificent full scale exact replica—minus the broken bits—of the REAL Parthenon!   We trot around the outside of it and it's pretty impressive. We then go inside and the best bit is that they have a HUGE statue of the Athena Parthenos! Wow... She's rather magnificent. She's 42 feet tall and is gilded in gold leaf. In her right hand is a 6 foot statue of the god Nike—he looks nowhere near that size, when you are gazing up in awe at her. She also has a serpent at her feet and a giant shield. She looks like a warrior Amazon woman and it's not surprising really that Greek women are fairly strong women in general. I am very impressed with her.   We wander out of there and decide to go to Broadway in 'The District' to get Aaron a cowboy hat. A real one. 'The District' is about 3 blocks on Broadway, right downtown in Nashville that is the happening music part of town. This is the bit you saw in the movie Kenny, with the sushi cowboy. We spent ages trying to work out what bars they were in and where they were. We wish we had the movie with us, so we can check it! As you can gather by now, we are film set junkies. :-)     This section of Broadway is pretty neat. It has a nice feel to it and not at all intimidating. There is a nice selection of Neon, which I am an aficionado of. I can't wait to see it later at night. We figure out where we will be going later and set off to find Aaron his cowboy hat. Someone told us THE place to go but we've forgotten and they all end up sounding the same. Betty Boots is the best name though and one of the best neons. We go to Boots and More and they have a serious selection of boots and hats. This is not a tourist shop, per se, this is real country wear!     I try on a few hats but decide to not invest in a 'real' one. I'm not sure how often I would wear it, rather than my 'Southern Belle' hats I like. Aaron is unsure what to get. It all seems a bit intimidating and there are hats for Africa! Finally a nice person comes and helps us and Aaron gets his head size right. The straw hats look well... cheap. So, I say, go for a 'real' one. He tries on a few and I have to say—it's impressive. We have often looked for hats for him but they all seem to sit on top of his head like an egg cosy. But with the right head size, things are looking up. He finds one that just looks wonderful on him. "Get it!" I say. "That's the one!" He does. And this is where I threaten the sales person with death, if no one else is wearing one tonight when we go out! We go back to the camper and get changed, then come back into town. Aaron is wearing jeans, a white shirt and his new black cowboy hat—he looks sooooooo good. I am wearing a black and white dress, aqua accessories and a shiny sparkly aqua blue cowboy hat that cost me 20 bucks at the RV gift shop! It's very fun! We practice our finger tipping rim nod and our ma'ams. We are all set. We get into town about 6.30 and things are starting to jump. There's a lot of bare heads around. I check to see whether Boots and More is still open... We decide we don't care. We are going to have a GOOD time!   The neon is starting to stand out more, there are more people on the street and every bar has music pouring out of it. We trot up and down and finally go into Jimmy Buffets Margaritaville restaurant. Despite being American chain food, it's good.   The staff are friendly and helpful. The balloon man on stilts is busy and he's great to watch—making people hats of love hearts, parrots, jester hats, pirate hats, daisy hats...very fun. He also joined one group of people together and they had to do a congo line through the restaurant. But everyone was a good sport about it and it was entertaining.       We ordered wayyyyyyy too much food but all of it really good! We boxed up half of it in the ubiquitous doggie bag and took it to a man panhandling on the street with his dog, we had seen earlier. He asks us jokingly as we near him if we have any leftovers we can spare and we hand him the whole bag. We all grin at each other and we leave him to it and go up the street to our final stop for the evening.   We are headed for a bar called 'The Big Bang Bar'—a dueling piano bar upstairs. We get there about 7.30 so we can get a table. It's only half full at this point but later gets completely filled up. What a fantastic place! On the stage are two pianos, a bass guitar and a drum kit. Both pianos are being played by very skilled pianists and they're both singing. Every so often, one of them leaps on the drums and adds to the music that way. You name it—they play it! We have bits of paper on our table that we can write down song requests on. You then take these up to the piano and slide them on there with some dollars. At the start of the evening, they do a good job of playing everyone's requests. As the evening goes on, requests and money piles up but no matter what you hear—it's good! And no matter what anyone asks for—they can play it. They only get a bit stumped on one song by 50 cent, but do about half of it. The range is phenomenal. Elton John (of course,) Neil Diamond, Nirvana, Bob Marley (amazing how good his songs sound without the reggae beat to them,) Billy Joel (of course,) Chuck Berry, Metallica, Queen, Lady Gaga, Snoop Dogg...the list goes on. And these guys joke and sing, do the voices. A particularly good rendition of Adam Sandler. They are a complete entertainment package. We thought initially we might stay for an hour say, then go and see some other places but four hours later, we finally leave. God, it was good! They change musicians every so often, but they always have 2 guys on the pianos, bantering back and forth, singing, playing... Very very talented and one guy Eddie is a show in himself. We are having a ball. This is the best night that Aaron and I have had for ages...     We love being back in the South... We love the energy and the people as a whole. Did we find the holy grail here yet... Well, no. At this stage I have no idea what all the Tennessee energy was about. Nothing has jumped out at us and said—THIS IS YOUR SIGN Meg Amor. Dang. But despite that, we have thoroughly enjoyed Tennessee. And isn't that what's it all about at the end of the day anyway. Are you having a good time? Are you enjoying yourself? Are you having fun? Do you feel alive?