--- In doobiefans@yahoogroups.com, Chris Rhine <chrisr_777@...>
wrote:

First off, the trouper of the week award has to go to my wife Heidi.
She usually drives because she is not a very good passenger, all the
miles were hers. My son has been in a National Guard sponsored boot
camp since July. Last weekend was his first home pass. Heidi had to
drive from Los Angeles to San Luis Obispo (200 miles) to pick him up
and then drive back to Los Angeles (200 miles) on Friday. We hit the
road at 5:00 a.m. Saturday to drive to Sonoma (400 miles). Because
we didn't get there until 11:00 a.m. we had to sit off to the side
where we could not see the stage. The sound also is not that great
over there. But, with the atmosphere of the winery and what we could
hear of the show we had fun. We also were able to get up and walk
over to where we could see the stage when we wanted. All of the
bands put on good, if short, sets. There were quite a few people we
knew there as well. The guy that was mentioned in the Doobie Hat and
Fan Club T-shirt was probably Earl
Broderick who was there with Vicki. We also saw Rick and Lori
Seamon, Rich and Julie Verson, Doobie Dan, Laurin Willis, Jim Marr
and Geoff Bellew making it a truly international showing from the
Fan Club. All of them had shown up early and had the best seats in
the house front and center. We also saw Shad Meeshad and Mike
Washington from the NVF. Shad tried to talk us into coming back for
the Sunday show, but Jordan would have killed us if he didn't get to
see any of his friends on his home pass. When the Doobies hit the
stage everyone moved forward to the stage, so Heidi, Jordan and made
it to the side of the stage and watched the show about five feet
away from Michael. The strangest thing about the stage is that it is
not raised at all, so you are standing at the same level as the
band. I was able to look down at Michael's hands and see that was
not actually playing his keyboards a during some of the songs, but
hey, with little or no time for rehearsal there is only so
much that you can do. They did very well on the Michael songs that
are not usually in the set though, especially Marvin Gaye's "Heard
it Through the Grapevine" (I don't feel guilty about revealing a
song since I doubt they will be playing it again anytime soon). A
few songs into the set Pat got a note to read to the crowd about a
missing 10 year old kid. Before he could finish the missing kid
popped out of the crowd at center stage right next to Pat! Kids
should always tell their parents where they are going, but if he was
going to be front and center at a Doobie Brothers concert he at
least has his priorities straight. Pat led him off the stage and let
him watch the rest of the show next to the soundboard. That was not
the funniest thing that happened though. After the band finished the
closing number, said goodnight and left the stage, Michael was still
sitting at his keyboard adjusting knobs. He suddenly noticed
something was wrong and looked around to see he was alone.
He jumped up just as Ed Ryan was walking over to get him. I have
never seen Ed laugh so hard in my life. He laughed so hard his
chewing gum came flying out of his mouth. At he end of the encore,
members of most of the bands that had played during the day came out
and sang LTTM. All in all it was a great day and we will absolutely
do it again next year. Now back to Heidi's travels. We left the
winery for our hotel in Rohnert Park (25 miles), had dinner and went
to bed. We got on the road home to Los Angeles (416 miles) about
8:00 a.m. so Jordan had time to see some friends. Monday afternoon
they were back in the car to take him back to Camp San Luis Obispo
(200 miles) and Heidi got home (200 miles) about 10:00 p.m. last
night. About 1650 miles in four days with a Doobie show thrown in.
Wow.

Chris

"All musicians go through a phase where they're fascinated by
technique or flash. Love of music eventually smoothes all that out"
- Jerry Garcia

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