2016 Spring June 8 Wednesday

2016 Spring June 8 Wednesday

Up at 4:40 a.m. (EDT), 63 degrees

63 degrees this morning

Knoxville, perfect weather here.  Went to the “Marketplace”, where on a perfect Tuesday evening it was packed with people, free music etc.  This is a series of restaurants.  We ate at the “Tomatohead”.  

We kept thinking it was Friday or Saturday night, it was so busy.  I always lose my sense of what day it is during vacation!

They did this  (The Marketplace) right.  The air was crisp and coolish so it was a perfect night.  I expect the altitude is higher here.

Just checked, and the altitude is actually only 886’ in Knoxville. (Memphis is around 200’).

Enjoyable visit with friends yesterday and will visit this morning.  We were trying to figure out how many places we have met them for a visit and it is quite a few in the past 19 years, since we first met in OKC for our wedding!  Just a few are Chicago, New Orleans, Myrtle Beach, of course, Lakeland, OKC, Nashville, Gatlinburg, Virginia etc.

Gatlinburg was actually one of our first introductions to Tennessee.  We were in Knoxville and decided to go the the little “mountain town” of Gatlinburg with a population of 2,000 or so  Imagine our surprise when we saw a Hard Rock Cafe in the city! Of course, it is a tourist destination, although they had so many conferences there it got boring.  They do have an excellent aquarium  there.  

Today is our last “normal” day, as the CMA Fest starts tonight (actually Thursday morning).  We are looking forward to it.  I like the fact they have the all types of singers, from the ones who have been singing for a long time and maybe aren’t quite so popular anymore more (discreetly classified as “legends”), current stars, and brand new singers who are just starting.  It provides a lot of variety and is a lot of fun.

As I mentioned before, the big problem is the crowds have gotten so bad (they have opened up a lot of the venues for “free” which makes it difficult for the “paid” attendees to enjoy many of the events) that it makes it difficult to get around.

Of courses, the hotels make it worse by gouging attendees for as much as they can get and more.  We have managed to escape the gouging by using “points’ in the past, but that won’t be possible in the future.

Anyway, as I mentioned the other day the anticipation is fun, and normally although there are some disappointments (the waiting is the worst part), it is a lot of fun.  

We are debating whether this will be our last one (or at least take a break) primarily due to the potential hotel costs. 

We have new seats this year (they are changing the configuration of the stadium seating) and we have until June 16 if we want to renew.  Of course, one good thing about going ahead with the ticket renewal is the event has gotten popular enough we can sell our tickets if we decided not to attend, probably for a nice profit.  

Hopefully the weather will be nice (not too hot, no rain) the next 4 days!  It seems somehow, the CMA Fest is the first truly “hot” days of summer every year so it is hot and we haven’t had a chance get used to it yet.  But we’ll just go with the flow and enjoy what we can.

That’s it for now, Wednesday, June 8, 2016.