Colorado Cowboy Poet Gathering

What can I say, I love this stuff. A sawbuck ($20 for you whippersnappers) got me an entire day of great entertainment, music and western culture. I went to this event in 2008 with Guitar and we both vowed to do it again. I forget what happened last year but we missed it. This year I was determined to go and go I did yesterday a little after 9am.

Here’s the deal. There are about 40 different performers. Some are poets/humorists, some are musicians and some are both….God, this is hard to explain….groups of four or five performers, perform in a room, round robin style. There are four “sessions” per hour each with a different theme. Examples of the themes are, “Get ‘er Goin”, “Modern Ranch Life”, “Bunkhouse Banter”, “Cowboy Humor”, “Critters”, “Dancin’ & Romancin”. Each hour you have to pick the session you want to attend based on either the subject or the performers, or however you want. The performers switch between groups based on the subject matter so it gets pretty complex. I chose most sessions with the goal of seeing as many different performers as possible. After re-reading this paragraph, the easiest thing to do is give you this link so you can see the actual schedule

This year’s group of performers hailed not only from Colorado and most of the other western states but New Hampshire, Canada and Australia as well. The caliber of talent was amazing, especially considering that they are just “local”. You will not hear any of these artists on top 40 radio or see them listed on Ticketmaster for a concert but listening to a complex story told in rhyme and/or accompanied by guitar, banjo, or bones was one of those experiences where you told yourself, while listening, “wow, this is really good!”. I may have only paid a sawbuck for the entrance fee but by the time it was all over I spent three times that much on CDs to take the experience home with me.

It was after 5pm when I left and I had to face a vicious rush “hour” commute on a holiday weekend to get back home. One of the biggest “perks” of being retired is that I can normally avoid this unpleasantness but this day I had to endure. It was, however, well worth it.

This afternoon, The Circle will visit the yearly RV show at the Denver Convention Center. Even though I am NOT in the market anymore, I still like looking and all the different models. Both Guitar and Two Tall-Two Timing now have the “urge” to upgrade and I’ll have a large time goading them into it. It should be a fun time.

Monday morning I have an appointment with a sawbones….this is getting to be a theme post…sawbuck, sawbones. I didn’t even plan it! Anyway, I’ve got to have a bone spur taken off one of my toes. It will be outpatient surgery but I’ll be unable to drive for about two weeks. More to follow on this.

Thanks for visiting.