Who Shot JR?

So back on March 22^nd, Ryan and I attended the Texas Music Revolution out at Southfork Ranch.  We’d heard tickets were $26 to get in and acts such as Ray Wylie Hubbard, Two Tons of Steel, the Tejas Brothers, Max Stalling and of course our personal favorite, Walt Wilkins & the Mystiqueros (there were lots and lots more, but I don’t have room to name them all).  We figured that was a pretty fair price to get to hear all that talent, so off we went.  We were shocked when we learned at the door that they wanted $40 a piece for us to get in…YIKES!  Now, we’d come this far so we decided to go ahead and pay it.  Once we got in, we discovered it was complete chaos.  It was absolutely gorgeous outside (little windy, but that was it), but they had elected to have the concerts inside.  There were two extremely large banquet halls connected to one another with a smaller music stage in one (aka “Long-Haired Goateed Hippie Stage” in the Lone Star Atrium), and a large stage (aka “Shiner Stage” in the Oil Baron’s Ballroom) in the other.  Different bands played every 45 minutes…on alternating stages.  So the crowd would shift back and forth every 45 minutes on the dot.  We started out trying to see Max Stalling in the big room.  Listened to a couple of his songs, then decided to jump ship for a while and go tour the “mansion.”  It was so neat getting to walk around in there.  I don’t remember too many episodes, but one thing was clear…Southfork is A LOT smaller than it looked on TV.  The pool could have easily fit in Ryan and I’s living room…but nonetheless, really neat to see it!  We walked all over the first floor (second floor was roped off to visitors).  I took a video with my cell phone, and dad gum it, I erased it just like I did in Cabo!  Oh well…you’ll just have to trust me it was neat :o)  Seriously the house was no bigger than a home you might see in a neighborhood such as Interlochen.  Would have fit right in.  Anywho, back to the $40 band thing. So after touring the house and walking past a couple of the horse pastures, we went back in to the Ewing Ballroom where they were serving bbq, burgers, etc.  We sat for a couple minutes trying to figure out how we were going to make it through four more hours of this in order to get to hear Walt and the boys sing.  That’s when John Meacham surprised us!  He and his wife Maddy are a couple we frequently hang out with when going to see Walt.  They had arrived about when we did and snagged a table in front of the hippie stage.  So for the rest of the afternoon, the four of us sat, chatted and visited.  Maddy and I sipped on our waters while our boys sipped on their Shiners.  Walt started playing right around 7…and during the show he calmly announced the musicians’ prep room had run out of frosty beverages…so Ryan and John took off to go get the boys provisions.  One problem…they’d run out of Shiner!  They sponsored the thing and had run out of their signature beverage by 7!  They had to settle for Shiner Black.  Walt and the boys started early, ran late, and then came and sat down with us and we all chatted for about thirty minutes until the crowd once again started shifting into the lone star atrium.  We were home by 9 and ended up having a nice time with our friends.  Next year we will be doing one of two things though…finding a group of five to split the tickets and only pay $20 a person for them, or not go at all. 

Please also note, the number of high school/college kids “tailgating” in the fields, then going into an enclosed area made the rooms reek of the smell of recess…still trying to figure out why the events weren’t held outside.  Oh well.