Doin's At the Fair

Only fools go the Ozark Empire Fair on a day where the temperature hovers around 100, right?

Well ... right.

Call me a fool.

Every year old buddy Jim Bohannon does his national radio program from the fair ... and it is always good. And since he is so busy with speaking engagements, the Jim Bohannon show at night and the news program America in the Morning early mornings I seldom get to visit with him or his lovely wife. So I go to the fair where I can sit with Annabelle and enjoy the show. Jim also brought me a couple of gifts and I am still chuckling. You will be reading about them in this blog.

Last night the Lennon sisters were there -- well, at least three of the 1,200 or so Lennon sisters were there. Of course, the Lennon name is always connected with Lawrence Welk. Which reminds me of the best Branson story: Branson is a place where the audience has one foot in the grave; and some of the performers, like Lawrence Welk, have both. Jim Stafford notes that those horrific traffic jams you see on the strip are just caused by the Lennons and the Osmonds going to work.

At any rate, think what you will about their music they are a delightful family, still full of spark and life, who appear to really enjoy what they do and have a lot of fun doing it. I hated hearing that Peggy has remarried and is now living in California. Damn, missed another one!

Jim always has the headline performer on. Last night it was a country singer named Blake Shelton. I had never head of him but his sound is pretty enjoyable, even for a non-country fan. But he was extremely personable and witty and did a great interview with Bohannon, And of course there were a zillion screaming groupies surrounding us. But don't think too much about that; when the old facist drunk Charlie Daniels was on a couple of years ago there were screaming groupies there too. Maybe it just speaks to the youth of the Ozarks.

But, for me the best part was the photo you see above. (Since blogger is going thru it's daily screw-up you can see the photo by going HERE)That's Bohannon on the left, all dressed up like the famous guy he is, and on the right is a fella named Les Garland. Les worked with Jim at old radio station KICK, here in town that everybody listened to, oh so, many years ago when we all were kids. Still say, so what? Well Les is married to an incredibly tall and beautiful, former model. Still say so what? Well he is a refound friend and now lives in the Branson area.

Boy, this audience is tough to impress. Let me try this.

How about if I tell you he was the one who started MTV?

Oh, now you're impressed. Guess that tells me about MY audience.

Les started MTV, and is now neck high in another ground breaking music presentation. Now I bet that impresses you.

I can't decided which I covet more. His money or his wife.