Christmas Off The Starboard Bow!

Christmas is coming. (I suppose that's a phrase you can utter 364 days of the year.) But with the advent of Christmas, Lost And Found plays a few Christmas Concerts each year, and this year was no exception. You'll recall (or will read below) that our first weekend took us out to Seattle for just one concert. We made up for the shortage of concerts that weekend by extending the weekend this week. (We're very pro-labor in this little band, it seems. Of course, a longer weekend doesn't mean a shorter work week if you only work on weekends. Perhaps we need to lobby for a longer work week and a shorter weekend. We are so out of step sometimes.)

Enough blabbering. We began the weekend on Tuesday, by playing a Christmas show at The Life Church, in Westbury, NY. This show was different from the first show, and the line-up included Lost And Found (duh), Famous Actor Justin Vetrano, The Amazin' Jazon, and Agape Dave Scherer. We had a tremendous turnout, and a really great show. Famous Actor Justin Vetrano had recently been doing some renovations on the building, and put all his tools away in time to welcome the crowd. As you can see in this photo, the folks at The Life have a real knack for squeezing people into small spaces.



The next morning, Agape flew home, and the rest of us headed out to Long Island. Or, that is, further out on Long Island. We played at the aptly named St. James Church in St. James. This show was different from the previous two shows, in that it was just Lost And Found and Famous Actor Justin Vetrano. Had a great time and saw lots of long-time friends. Then I dropped Michael off at Justin's house and drove back to The City.

The next day, being Thursday, our weekend continued, and the three of us met up at LaGuardia to fly to St. Louis, which we did. Troy and the Amazin' Jazon met us in St. Louis, and off we went to regroup for the morning. On Friday, we set up early and played a small version of the show for the local school at the church where we played that night. Famous Actor Justin Vetrano added a new character to the lineup, which was great fun. (And I learned the valuable lesson that kids pay attention to anyone who throws candy at them while talking. In this way, children are like seals and dolphins. But not in many other ways.)



That evening's Christmas Show was different from the three previous Christmas Shows in that the lineup included us, Famous Actor Justin Vetrano, the Amazin' Jazon, and our pals, Alathea, who were awesome as always. Lots of people came to the show, and the group from Waterloo, IL did their famous rap, broken foot and all. It's always entertaining to travel with someone who brings along costumes, and in the afternoon, we spent some time having a Christmas Character Fashion Show.





After the nightly dose of the Amazin' Jazon's pasta preparations, it was time to bust up the group. In the morning, everyone left except for Troy and us, and we headed west into Deep Missouri.

We ended our westward trek in Columbia, and we were happy to arrive. This show was different from the four previous Christmas Shows in that it wasn't a Christmas Show at all. Just a Lost And Found concert. Our friend Jamie provided a great room to play in, and we had a very interesting concert. I can't remember how it came about, but for some reason we told people to text their song requests to us. It became as much a social experiment as concert, since all sorts of new considerations came into play (anonymity of texters, and the judge's secrecy to ignore the unwanted ones). Maybe I'll write a doctoral thesis on the evening. Or maybe I'll just drink another cup of coffee.

Then the three of us made the long journey back to St. Louis. In the morning, Michael drove off toward Chicago, and Troy and I flew home to our respective homes, at which we all arrived safely. Though I did have the experience of landing at LaGuarida on the over-water approach and hearing the "wind sheer" alert coming from the cockpit. That will get your blood pumping, as they say. (Which is not to say it is a human heart. I just mean it upped the adrenilyne level in the cabin.)

Anyway, now we're all home. Or somewhere like it. I've got to get to packing to fly out to meet my family. (But, shhh, don't tell the cat. He gets a little vocal when he senses everyone's leaving him.) I thought I would leave you with a couple pictures to show you how we get our Christmas trees in New York. It's probably a little different in your neighborhood, but we use a lot less lights.






Merry Christmas!