Chilly Saturday Morning at Chez Merrique

Well well well. Early Saturday morning and I'll be taking out o' here in a couple hours to do deliveries for Tinwings, the glorious gourmet grab-and-go market conceived and made golden by my lovely wife. I'm the back-up delivery guy, and her former delivery person is herself taking off for a 3 month chef gig in Greenland (!) tomorrow. It'll be fine, and the sky is blue and though it's chilly outside again I do love to drive all over my hometown and leave amazing, delicious food fare on doorsteps of some of the hundreds of clients who partake of her scrumptiousness regularly.

Tinwings in The Nations Nashville

We went to a live performance in the tiny Basement venue Thursday, to see and hear a solo performance by Tommy Prine, and we were treated to one song featuring guest star Amanda Shires. What a treat, the whole thing. Tommy's first LP will release in late June and we were lucky to have heard many of its songs. I'll tell you this: Tommy has inherited his father's gift for storytelling with metaphore, irony, and humor, but he has already proven that he has his own distinct voice, and it's beautiful and I am now a hardcore fan. I taught him every week for years in my University School of Nashville computer lab and I am so proud of hisgrownupself. As we were leaving after he said, "Mr. Merrick, thank you for coming," and I responded, "Ha, you can call me Scott." Made me smile. And I did say hi to Amanda just before leaving, introducing her to my honey. Amanda sometimes comes by to work in Charles's open studio class and she is, besides being a powerhouse superstar musician and singer, a hugely talented painter. She is also one of the nicest human beings it has been my pleasure to meet.

I'm currently working on a couple paintings, and I made good progress on my 16x20 painting of my best pal Watson last week. Charles Brindley's painting class at Scarritt Bennett Center has been on break for a few weeks and starts up next week, so Wednesday I took the hour or so at his invitation I drove up to his home in Adairville, Kentucky and spent a few hours painting under his supervision/tutelage. I got home with this improved version of mah boy (note that some of what you see is visual "notes" for me to revise, but I'm increasingly happier with it):

"Watson", in progress

And Charles gave me some great ideas for directions I can pursue on this abstract, which I am thinking will be dubbed "metronome":

"metronome", in progress

Lastly, for now, I've been doing some recording, and this one below kinda fun, I think. I'm not happy with my melody line yet, or the recording quality (Audacity with a USB mic on my Dell All-in-One computer) but I'm confident it will get there. Here's the lyrics I'm working with. Can you envision a melody for it? I may just keep what I've got and enhance it with other instruments but I'm open to hear a rough recording. Post it here in a comment...

Goin' Somewhere

by Scott Merrick

We're walking in the morning
Breathing in the freshest air
We're walking in the morning
Looking 'round to see what's there
And in the sky
a jet plane
flying high
Somebody goin' somewhere.
It's all of life we're livin'
We laugh we cry we don't give up
Whatever we are given
Reachin' out to scoop it up
And in the sky
a jet plane
flying high
Somebody goin' somewhere.
Somewhere a baby cries
Somewhere a lover sighs
Somewhere laughter
Somewhere tears
Somewhere a song begins
Somewhere a train comes in
Somewhere hope
Somewhere good cheer.
BRIDGE
Somewhere the darkest night
Somewhere the sun is bright
Somewhere you're home
Somewhere it's time
Somewhere friends arrive
Somewhere no compromise
Somewhere alone
Somewhere just fine.
 We're sitting on the back porch
Talking out the day's events
We're sitting on the back porch
Wonderin' where the weekend went
And in the sky
a jet plane
flying high
Somebody goin' somewhere.

That's it for this morning. Gonna feed Watson, toss on some warm layers, and drive around Nashville.

Happy Birthday to my magical godson, Seamus. I miss y'all but we'll be gettin' out your way someday soon