St. Clair Rocks Too!

On Thursday Dorcas got her hair cut at the Blue Water College of Cosmetology in Marysville. I offered to cut it for her for free. She declined and instead squandered $7.50 so an out of work auto worker, spending Obama's stimulus money in a futile attempt to learn another trade, could do it. After every step throughout the process the instructor would come over and check the student's work. Dorcas declined the optional blow dry for an additional $2.00 (that's my gal!). It must have come out OK. Momma is happy.

On Friday and Saturday we explored the small town of St. Clair. It turns out St. Clair is having their annual Riverfest event this weekend, featuring concerts and boat races. It's a pretty big event for such a small town. Friday night and Saturday night featured live music from about 5:30 until midnight, with five bands playing each night. The stage is actually on a barge tied up to the town waterfront boardwalk. Friday night's headliner was Eddie Money. Any rock and roller alive in the 70s and 80s will remember Eddie Money. He put on a great show and the crowd was "Shakin' " throughout his whole set. A surprisingly fun group was the Dave Hamilton Band, a local group from somewhere in Michigan. Dave Hamilton is a fantastic rock and blues guitar player and his group played a wide variety of rock styles. It was lots of fun to watch a black rock trio playing ZZ Top hits! We also enjoyed the Rod Stewart Tribute Band. The lead singer didn't sound particularly like Rod, but he had the look and mannerisms down pat. His band was also very good; a very strong musical performance. The disappointment of the show was Saturday's headliner, Josh Gracin. Gracin was an American Idol finalist in its second season. While Gracin is a very strong singer and entertaining performer, his band never exhibited any soul or instrumental improvisation. All his songs sounded pretty much the same. We left before he had finished his show, as did many other folks in the audience. Last year in late August we attended the Boundary Waters Blues Festival in Ely and really enjoyed it. This year they moved the date for that festival up to, ironically, this weekend. We really wanted to attend the Boundary Waters Blues Festival, but knew we couldn't due to the date change. The music at the St. Clair Riverfest was a pretty good substitute.

Another event on Saturday and Sunday was the St. Clair River Classic Offshore Powerboat Race. We didn't attend the races, but saw some of the big boats in town and cruising the river. It looked like it would br fun, in a sort of upper Midwest redneck kinda of way.