We’ve been here before. If you’ve read my previous post about the lackluster display of talent at any of Harrisburg’s Arts/Kipona/Music Fests, I apologize for being redundant. But in the spirit of speaking my mind about the things that are happening in Harrisburg today, I feel overwhelmingly compelled to write this post. Here, in some sort of order, [...]

Checked out American MusicFest this afternoon with Meg, her brother and his girlfriend. The weather looked threatening the entire time, but it really didn’t do much other than drizzle. To be honest, I was a bit surprised by the crowd. I thought it would be a bit larger and a bit more enthusiastic. Maybe in the evening when the bar crowd started filtering over things picked up a little bit. I’m sure the weather didn’t help. I had planned to get there early enough to see The Tamboureens at noon, but it just didn’t happen. As it was, we saw a band called Old Man Cactus instead, and I thought they were really good. I could have listened longer, but we wanted to walk around. All in all, it was an enjoyable afternoon. I took some pictures, and you can check them out here. For now I’m using Facebook because Flickr won’t allow me to create anymore photo sets. Grrr. Hope you all had a great holiday.

Really, there is nothing better than having Independence Day fall on a Friday. In fact, I propose that July Fourth should be a Friday every year from now on. Impossible? Nah. Next year, with the Fourth falling on a Saturday, we all get hosed. Bad times, right? Wouldn’t it just be better to flip the third and Fourth. Really, it would bother you that much if July next year went Wednesday the first, Thursday the second, Friday the Fourth, Saturday the third and Sunday the fifth? I didn’t think so. With the Fourth on Friday, not only can you get after it on Thursday night if that’s your scene, but you also have three straight days of vegetation. I suppose when the fourth is on a Thursday, that gives you four straight days of vegetation with the slight inconvenience of one of those days taking place in the office, but whatever. In addition to the veritable cornucopia of Fireworks shows that we covered yesterday taking place around the area, there are two big events this weekend that have kind of dwarfed everything else going on: Carlisle Summerfair and American MusicFest in Harrisburg. Summerfair is a family event in Carlisle that includes a lot of cool stuff. Highlights? Hmm… Thursday night, you have classic rock cover band Cheap Sneakers playing in the square in Carlisle. Friday there’s a mini-golf tournament and the hilarious, “Anything Floats” boat race on Boiling Springs Lake. There are also multiple performances of the musical “Clue” on Saturday and Sunday and “Much Ado About Nothing” in Thornwald park Sunday evening. There is too much going on in too many different places for us to really get it all on Spotobe, plus we haven’t really made it to Carlisle yet, but you can get a full schedule here. As for MusicFest, I’ll be there on Friday (If you’d like to see Friday’s schedule, here ya go. Here’s Saturday, and here’s Sunday). I’d like to see The Tamboureens, who kick things off at noon on the Market St. Stage. I love retro Brit-pop bands like Rooney, and that’s The Tamboureens all the way. I also wouldn’t mind seeing Lasting Factor, who are on the Market St. Stage at 4:30. I even bought one of their songs, “Bella” on iTunes, despite their non-descript name. (I was actually just listening to that song while I wrote this, and when it ended, “Wanna Be a Baller” by Lil’ Troy came on next. Yowza, that was a cultural shift that might have registered on the Richter scale.) Really, other than the big two and some fireworks, there’s not tons of stuff happening this weekend. I’m sure you all have 37 cookouts to go to anyway, so be safe and have fun with your friends and family.  Like I said, for me it’s fireworks in Hanover tonight, MusicFest tomorrow and who knows the rest of the weekend. If you see me out come say, “hi.” Have fun kids.