Category Archives: Cross Canadian Ragweed

Cross Canadian Ragweed, lake surfing, Oasis Shaved Ice, Table Rock Lake, Table Rock State Park Marina

Table Rock 2011 Day 6: The Last Dance…

We hit the lake earlier than we have been because it’s our last day.  It turns out for the best because of two things.

First, it’s Friday, and the weekend visitors are starting to roll in.  That makes for a busy lake and crappy boarding water.

Second, the clouds have moved in and threaten to bring in some rain.  At the very least, the wind is picking up.  Great for heat relief.  Crappy boarding water.

Seeing a trend?

I get back to the music basics and pull out the CD that was last year’s soundtrack almost exclusively:  Cross Canadian Ragweed’s Back to Tulsa.  Great music to watch Max tear it up on the board by going out of the wake both directions (hard to believe this is the same kid who was literally shaking when we put him in the water with skis last year…and we didn’t even move the boat then).

Max’s boarding close up

Outside the wake…on the “hard” side

Not to be outdone on a number of fronts, Mara kicks it into gear and loses a tooth plus also goes outside the wake.

Tooth in hand…but hard to see a gap when her mouth is shut

Surfer girl!

We manage to hold on to our new anchor, have one last round of shaved ice and a final campfire complete with burnt marshmallow s’mores. Plus, we are packed and ready to hit the road bright and early back to KC.

Love that green apple with extra sour…Yum!
The flash sorta dims the light of the fire…
Cross Canadian Ragweed, Jason Aldean, Table Rock Lake, Table Rock State Park

It’s Table Rock Time!

We are on the road at 7 a.m. and not even to the stop sign at the end of our street when I realize one thing (and, as it eventually turns out, the only thing) we have forgotten.  My sunglasses.  When we are spending a week at the lake.  The hottest, sunniest week of the year.  Being that it is the third year in a row that we have selected said hottest, sunniest week (we even managed it last year after spending two months’ in Hawaii), we contemplate getting jobs at the Farmers’ Almanac but they don’t appear to have any openings.  And we don’t turn around or stop for my glasses.

We roll into Hollister, MO in record time (about 4 hours later) just in time for lunch at Max’s favorite “fast food” – Subway!  We put gas in the RV and the and discover that not all gas stations carry cheap sunglasses.  So I take Max’s – pulling rank is one of the advantages of being the parent.  That, and I’m the boat driver.  Two points in my favor!

This first afternoon brings the standard menu of activities:  tubing, surfing and wakeboarding by Mike and some tandem surfing by Mike and Max.  The soundtrack courtesy of Jason Aldean’s My Kinda Party and Cross Canadian Ragweed’s Happiness and All the Other Things.

Max + Mara on the tube

Mike + Max tandem surfing
AMP, Chickentfoot, Cody Canada, Cross Canadian Ragweed, The Departed band, Yorktown

Extended Playback…Love the Music!

As you may know (goodness knows exactly how), we are live music fans. Ok, Mike is the BIG live music fan. I’m coming along slowly – and I’m a little pickier. Still, we’ve been going to concerts and bordered on becoming groupies (according to co-workers) to one group in particular.

But that might be an afront to actual groupies, and I don’t want to offend anyone!

Starting in 2009, continuing into 2010 and already into 2011, we’ve had our share of concerts…here are the highlights:

Chickenfoot…they don’t think they are a supergroup…but heck, that’s what they are. Sammy Hagar (love him!), Joe Satriani, Michael Anthony, Chad Smith…and man, can they rock! They did just that at the Uptown Theater in KC in August 2009…(Mike wanted me to use the pic with all the hot chicks but I am exercising my editorial prowess…it IS a family blog!)

Sammy and Joe…
and Chad (sorry, no shot of Michael…except with the chicks)

Cross Canadian Ragweed (this is an affiliate link to our favorite album of theirs) More memories here than we can almost count…it really got rolling in August 2009 at the MO State Fair and kept going right through 2010 when the band decided to come off the road. By virtue of them, I have uncovered (or rediscovered) a great love of Americana rock, and we both found a new band by way of the Cleveland concert in December 2009. Said new band was from…wait for it…southern Missouri. They are Ha Ha Tonka (new album in early April 2011!) and totally worth checking out.

Cleveland Rocks!
Ragweed…from the Cleveland House of Blues Balcony

In 2010, we saw CCR 4 times…in Lawrence at the Granada in February 2010, the Blue Note in Columbia, MO in mid-April, in Fayetteville, AR over Labor Day weekend at AMP (no, not the restaurant in Hawaii – the Arkansas Music Pavilion which is like a perma-tent with a kick butt stage and sound system in the parking lot of a mall – behind Dillard’s. Kids, you just can’t make this stuff up!) and finally in San Antonio, TX (really a little bitty town an 1 1/2 hours away) in mid-October at Ziegfest-Western Days. I could go on and on about how we thought about sleeping in the nursing home instead of driving the 1 1/2 hours back to our hotel…but nah.

At the Blue Note in Columbia for Ragweed…in a Chickenfoot shirt
AMP – you can’t really see the mall in this pic…
Cody Canada at Yorktown, TX Western Days…our last concert

Catching up to real time…A couple of the Ragweed guys have started a new band, The Departed. We checked them out in Lawrence in January 2011. They are coming along nicely, but they don’t hold the same place as Ragweed does in our hearts…yet.

Jen