I had a great time with my wife, mother in-law and my son Jake last weekend at the West Memphis HS Band Competition.  My niece, Shelby, participated and did a great job with the Senatobia Marching Band.  She’s part of the auxiliary.  She plays with the band as well (flute) during regular concert season.

But it brought back some great memories.  The band at the high school where I went has kind of fallen on tough times over the past few years.  Part of it is leadership.  It’s embarrassing to watch them march when I see them in a parade.  Shelby’s band (and every band I saw this weekend) is playing at a very different and much higher level of performance.  In a word, all the bands were “tight”. 

The band director when I was in school, ironically named “Ben King”, was a very good conductor, teacher, and leader.  We also had a culture then where the sports players played in the band and it was considered “cool”.  Nowadays, things are so “specialized”. 

But I truly think leadership is what inspires the future.  It was really exciting to see the young people this past weekend and it brought back some great memories.  I thought about Mr. King this weekend. I may not be a professional saxophone player, but band and his leadership changed my life.  I hope Shelby relishes these experiences. 

My wife and I took our son Jake for a great Autumn trip to visit my folks in Illinois.  The colors in Missouri and Illinois are in full “change”.  Way ahead of Tennessee for the most part. 

This trip was partly to celebrate my wife starting her new job at Willis here in Memphis.  I’m so proud of her.  I admire her work ethic very much. 

Not only did we take time to celebrate her new job, but we went to our friend Bob and Joyce Sanvi’s annual “canjun” party.  We actually passed a trailer rig labeled with LSU stuff from Hommes, LA on I-55 in the Missouri boothill.  Stacy and I kept talking about that trailer because we knew LSU didn’t play Missouri or Illinois.  Turns out, they were the cooking crew for the party we went to the next day!

Friday night we also saw the Cardinals beat the Phillies and advance to the NLCS in baseball.  I’m obviously a huge Cardinals fan.  I actually have a “friend” here in Memphis who played for the Cardinals who is going to the game Friday.  I’ll share the rest of that story after Friday’s game!  But the story with the Cardinals has been this silly squirrel who ran across home plate.  The marketing has kicked in on that…with the rally squirrel stuff.  The funniest thing was when that “squirrel” turned up in the Philadelphia celebration with Octavio Dotel marching it around the clubhouse.

But Bernie Miklaz, a local columnist in St. Louis, brought up a good point that my friend Dennis and I were talking about.  The Cardinals aren’t about silly slogans, rally monkeys, squirrels, etc.  They are about Hall of Famers, Stan the Man, history, Red, Whitey Ball, the Wizards, the voice of Jack Buck saying “that’s a winner”, and guys like me who nearly cry on opening day when they prance the clydesdales out.  It’s like a part of your childhood that you feel.

Speaking of childhood, on our trip my son Jake (who almost suffers from exhaustion he loves my folks farm so much) made his monthly trip to see his friends (horses) Queenie, Cari, and Cooper.

We also had the chance to catch some fish at my folks’ pond and raise a flag at “Jake’s Place” (AKA “the Cardinal Cabin”), which is great and provides nice shade at our monthly fishing hole.

Things are going well…Good weather, finally, and we’re looking forward to spending some time with my family in the next few days.  My folks have a farm, and we’re big John Deere people.  Of course, they don’t have anything like this:

But there’s nothing like time on the farm… and time in Cardinal country!  I’m sensitive that we’re not technically in Cardinals country 100% because I have several Braves and Cubs friends.  But it makes me happy that the Cardinals are still playing baseball.

If you want to hear the games, you can support them on the other stations I work with: 92.9 FM ESPN/680 AM or 790 AM (tomorrow and Wed. games on 790 AM).  I’m actually responsible for managing content on those 2 stations.  Soon (Oct. 17th…you’re one of the 1st to know this if you’re reading my blog) we’ll launch another 790 Sports with even more sports content here in Memphis.