A quick trip to Louisville that featured the following items of note: a cheesy affair, a serendipitous occurrence that makes one question how big the world really is, and a red door that led to a shop, which I wouldn't be surprised to be there one day and gone the next (and, no, I don't mean closed, I mean gone somewhere else due to interdimensional travel, you know one of THOSE shops).
The Main Visits/Recommendations/Points of Interest (outside of the concert)
- Stayed in Shelby Park 🔗
- Lunch and shopped at Logan Street Market 🔗
- With more food, drink, and dining at the following restaurants, all of which get the royal recommendation:
- Guacamole Modern Mexican, or not your average Mexican restaurant 🔗
- Atrium Brewing 🔗
- Toasty's Tavern 🔗
- The Breeze Wine: way more than just wine, think great bodega-like market with pretty much anything you'd need for a quick visit 🔗
- Canary Club for a late night nite cap, also connected directly to the Breeze Wine 🔗
- Nouvelle Wine Bar: seriously such a cool spot. Alas, I took no photos of the secret garden patio OR the jazz musicians that leveled up the atmosphere even further 🔗
- Red Tree Nulu: I have to post the Instagram for this one, because their main website just does NOT do it justice nor give you an idea of what to expect with this store. GREAT place to wander into off the street, eclectic collection of curious, artifacts, decor, etc. Also, this is the shop that may or may not be able to travel to different dimensions. 🔗
The World is Huge but Coincidences Like These Make It Feel Oh So Small
Walking around the aforementioned Logan Street Market Friday morning, we stopped to talk to one of the vendors, a kindly older gentleman, who gave us the lowdown on the THC/CBD products that were on offer at his booth, representing 502 Hemp (apparently they supply to Woody Harrelson's cafe/lounge in Los Angeles, allegedly).
Long story short, the conversation went as typical conversations tend to go and topics such as local or visiting (visiting, like the answer's not obvious already), oh, really where from? (Nashville area, which is my typical canned response that provides enough info without too much detail), then segwaying to the inevitable connections that our fellow conversationalist had to our most esteemed Music City, which consisted of some family members and a connection to an art school closer to Franklin if I recall correctly.
One of those family members, though, was mentioned to be a tattoo artist based out of Nashville. For full context, neither my friend nor I have any visible tattoos or piercings, nor have we mentioned anything along those lines. That being said, I do enjoy following tattoo artists and studios and other forms of visual art more generally on social media, so we asked the obvious question, really? What's the name of your relative? Maybe we'll check out his studio sometime or something.
Oh, our kindly older gentleman responds, his name is Evan Davis. Absolutely gobsmacked at the sheet coincidence of the universe, my jaw hit the floor as I pulled my sleeve back to reveal my first, and before a few months prior, only tattoo that I got sometime in...2017? I couldn't believe it. What a small world. For reference, it's a raven on my shoulder that I like to think of as either Huginn (or Muninn), or "Thought" and "Memory", from Norse mythology.
- Evan is currently at Black 13 Tattoo
- Here's his Instagram.
A Cheesy Affair: String Cheese Incident @ Iroquois Amphitheater
Part of the Just Keep Spinning Tour, our friends and I, thanks to the enterprising efforts of the love of my life, caught this performance. First time seeing a show in Louisville, let alone at the Iroquois Amphitheater, it was a good experience - String Cheese Incident never fails to disappoint.
My partner in crime and I have caught Cheese, oh, almost more times than I can remember at this point, but it was our friends' first Incident, and I believe they were pleasantly surprised. We may have converted them into true cheeseheads. Next step, incepting the idea of catching more Cheese at Hulaween this October, with the backup plan of if not this October then the next.
Embarrassing fun fact, I made it through the whole weekend thinking that I'd caught Billy Strings in Louisville sometime within the last year. No, silly goose, that was in Lexington not Louisville. shakes head
Setlist
Set One
Wild Wide Open Dreams, Lend Me A Hand, Smile, Black Market > Lost, Turn This Around > One Step Closer
Set Two
Solution, Light Fantastic, Black Clouds, Love Is Like a Train, Rain, Restless Wind > Howard
Encore
I Wish
"Trip the Light Fantastic"
I attribute my propensity for drawing connections, seeing patterns, researching the spread of an idea, concept, mind virus across people, time and space to my limited academic background in studying ahem Literature (yes, with a capital "L", for, of course, Loser).
Well, either that or maybe one too many psychedelic experiences over the years combined with a passion for the devil's lettuce.
Regardless, one such pattern that I've started to notice with increasing frequency is the phrase (and small variations thereof), "Trip the Light Fantastic", which ever helpful Wikipedia points out we can attribute/thank the English poet John Milton for coining, and more specifically, his 1645 poem L'Allegro. Here are the lines themselves:
From L'Allegro, addressed to Euphrosyne, according to Wikipedia one of the Three Graces (I was too lazy to learn more):
Come, and trip it as ye go
On the light fantastic toe,
And in thy right hand lead with thee,
The mountain-nymph, sweet Liberty;
There's all sorts of interesting information in the Wikipedia page on this phrase, what inspired it, and what other artistic expressions it then inspired, but interestingly enough, one reference not found on the page that I would think is fairly obvious is Terry Pratchett's second published novel in the Discworld universe, titled The Light Fantastic.
I know I've stumbled upon this phrase more recently in something I read, but for the life of me I can't find it at the moment. In any matter, I was pleasantly surprised when I heard the song "Light Fantastic" during String Cheese's performance (as you, dear reader, have as I'm sure noticed in Set Two). No doubt I've heard this song before, but this night marks the first time that I was aware of that connection. Trying to research the lyrics for this song was harder than I thought, and the closest I've been able to find is a version of the song that band member Kyle Hollingsworth released independently.
From the chorus:
Trippin' light fantastic, we're on the way
Leave it all to heart, let it fall away
Breaking the clouds, right storms the sun
Shine its light on everyone
