Chuck’s Tour Diary

11/13

Back to Van Nuys airport again…. this time to fly to Boise. But before departing, we had lunch in the cafe of the Four Seasons and killed time on the computers doing emails and other biz. This would be about a two hour flight…maybe a little more, but not too bad. Hardly any of us had been to Boise before…but one that had been there several times was our traveling Dr., Peter Hackett. Peter is a most interesting fellow…in 1981 he climbed Mt. Everest…on his own, and without supplemental oxygen. This would be the last day he would be with us…he has traveled off an on with us over the last three plus months. He’s a great guy, and Rosie and I invited him to have dinner with us as a send off. So after arriving in Boise and checking in to the Grove Hotel, we called him and met down in the lobby to have a drink in the bar before going to dine in the hotel restaurant. We had a nice talk…he told us some about his Everest adventure. He was number 117 to reach the summit of the mountain…and one of the very few to do it without supplemental oxygen. He has made a life study out of mountain climbing and high altitude effects, writing many articles and books on the subject. On the way back from his climb on Everest, he fell on the Hillary Step and nearly died. Only because he would up wedged between some rocks and was able to use his ice pick to pull himself up did he survive. Peter is also an avid environmentalist and we had a great talk about these issues. I feel as though we’ve made a friend for life in Peter, and I would love to be able to serve with him on some type of environmental Board. He’s an intelligent, articulate and experienced man and a pleasure to spend time with.
We finished up our dinner and bid the good Doctor goodbye, knowing that he was leaving the next day and we wouldn’t see him for quite a while. Then we made a fairly early night of it, turning in after an hour or so of channel surfing.

11/14

We were up by 10, and I went to the hotel fitness center to get in some walking. Shoulder still sore, and as much as I want to hit the weights, I’m going to let it heal completely before I try that again. Had a nice long walk on the treadmill, and I noticed looking out the window that there was a piano store nearby. Darryl had asked me recently about pianos…I think he’s going to trade up soon to a grand. So I took note of the place and would walk over there later. Back in the room I showered up and then Rosie and I went for lunch…the hotel restaurant was closed, but they were serving food in the bar, so we went there. Our friend Scott Jones was there and we sat with him and ordered lunch…which turned out to be a lot better than we thought it would. Rose Lane was tending to some business…getting contracts signed concerning music downloading deals for my CDs with iTunes International…and had to print out copies of the contracts, sign them and FedEx them off to where they needed to go. So while she was dealing with that, I took the opportunity to go to the Dunkley music store to see what kind of pianos they had. They carried Steinway, Boston, Kawai and a few other brands. I played a couple of nice Steinway model B’s that they had on hand (6′ 10″)…as well as a model D (9′). I tinkered around on them and was approached by a nice fellow named Tom, one of their salespersons. He suggested I play the Kawai (also a 9′), which I did…and I must admit I was most impressed by it. Anyway, I took some information from him to give to Darryl so I could let him know what I’d seen. Then it was getting close to time to leave for the show, so I walked back to the hotel to meet the rest of the folks going on the early van. The set list for the night would be a more standard one with mostly well-known songs…. but we did put in “Dead Flowers” for fun. Show was quite good…not as good as Vegas a couple of days before, but still a respectable showing. My pal Tom Knudeson who wrote the nice article on me for the Sacramento Bee recently was there with some of his friends and we had a nice time catching up…but other than Tom, I didn’t know anyone else in the Rattlesnake. Tom and his buds had been pheasant hunting the last couple of days and had invited me, but it’s just too difficult to try and to something like that with the limited time we have. Still, it was nice to hear the hunting gab.
We opted for a quiet night in the room after getting back from the show…. doing the usual packing for next day’s leave.

11/15, 16

It’s a pretty good flight from Boise to Atlantic City…some 4 + hours. I killed time by watching a DVD called “Why We Fight”….a film by Eugene Jarecki. Darryl had lent it to me a couple of weeks ago, and this was a good opportunity to watch it. It was so good that I watched it again straight away….two viewings in a row on the flight. Basically it goes back to the Eisenhower era and moves forward into our current situation in Iraq…and along the way it shows how in large part some of the decisions that were made concerning the Iraq War were heavily influenced by Corporate America and Think Tanks. It’s a very deep an interesting film, very well put together.

Rose Lane read some and slept a bit while I watched the movie. Soon we were approaching Atlantic City. There was some concern for a few minutes, as AC was experiencing heavy fog and the pilots had to contemplate landing in Philly if the fog was too heavy. In the end it was ok, and we landed in AC. We were very grateful for that, as it’s about a two-hour drive from Philly and would have caused us to be really late getting to the hotel. As it was, with the time loss, we didn’t get to the hotel until almost 11. Rosie and I walked around the Casino area of the Borgota Hotel in search of a restaurant that was open. We just missed Bobby Flay’s Steak House by a few minutes and were directed to a place called the Metropolitan Grill. It was ok…not great. But we were tired from the flight, so it didn’t matter so much. Caroline Clements, Isobel Work, Torje Eike and Bernard Fowler came in after we’d been there for 15 minutes or so, also looking for some food. They sat in a booth next to us, and we talked a little bit with them while we ate. After that we paid up and headed up to the room. Our body clocks were pretty screwed up from the travel and the remnants of our colds…we’re just about over them, but the pressure of the cabin during the flight didn’t help any…and we didn’t get to sleep until almost 4am.

The next day was a day off in Atlantic City. To be honest, not our first choice for a place to be with time on our hands. Rose Lane and I don’t gamble, and the Borgota is fairly isolated, and other than the hotel itself, there’s not anywhere to walk around. I will say, though…that the view of the swamps that were outside our 39th floor window offered a beautiful view. The weather was getting nasty and the forecast was for rain later….and we didn’t really want to get out in that, so we just walked around the Casino for a while, looking around…and had lunch at Wolfgang Puck’s grill. Then went back up the room and watched the tube, read some and I wound up taking a short nap. My manager Buck Williams called me to say I had been offered an interview with WIP radio…which is a popular sports radio program…for the next morning at 9:45am. I said I’d do it, and he gave me the number of Geoff Gordon, who would escort me to where the broadcast was being held…down in the lobby of the hotel…which would make it convenient. Finally, by about 8pm, we went out again. We had made a reservation at Bobby Flay’s for dinner at 9:15. So again, we killed time just walking around…by now we’re all too familiar with the layout of the Casino and the shops. We went ahead a little early to Flay’s and had a drink while we waited for our table. We both had steaks…and they were good, but at this point we are so sick of eating out all the time that if they were the best we ever had, we wouldn’t be able to truly enjoy it. We both long for our own kitchen…our grill under the patio just outside our kitchen…our own house and our own bed. Our dogs…horses…home. But it’s not all that long now…so we just float through the routine and are counting down the days.
Back in the room we again surfed the channels and the Net, fading out by about 2am or so.

11/7

Up and at ‘em yet again. At this point in the tour we are all beginning to count the days until the end and we get to go home. Not that we’re not still enjoying it…we are…but it’s been a long one and sometimes it feels like the Bill Murray movie “Groundhog Day” where you wake up every day and it’s all the same as the day before. Anyway, we got up and did our thing…making it back to the Mall Food Court again for lunch before checking out and moving on. We loaded up for the airport and were flying by the usual 4pm, headed to Phoenix. This would be our second trip there on the tour…last time playing at the Phoenix Glendale Arena. We were staying at the Phoenician Resort…the same place we stayed last time. It’s a neat place with a nice spread out feel to it…golf course, big area with fitness room and health facilities, large main building with a few shops and restaurants with some nice outside patios, all done in the Southwestern feel to it. There are some lovely cactus gardens, pools and nice outdoor areas throughout the resort.

We arrived there just after dark and were given the same room we had last time. Nice spacious suite with a covered patio. This is Election Day, and I was interested in watching the returns as they came in. But it was still a little early for that, and we went over to the main building to have drinks and dinner. There we ran into our friend Scott Jones, who owns the Ace Parking Company, and his girlfriend Sheila. We hooked up with them and wound up having a light dinner together, catching up on each other’s latest goings on. Right at the end, Tim Ries joined us for a glass of wine and a bit more conversation. After thanking Scott for dinner (he graciously picked up the check) we headed to the room to watch the election returns. As predicted, the Democrats did well….gaining control of the House and picking up several seats in the Senate…but there were a couple of races (Virginia and Montana) that were too close to call. Guess we’ll have to wait a day or two to see what happens on that front. I fell asleep on the couch watching all of it and crawled into bed about 2am.

11/8

Today we play at the new Cardinal Stadium in Glendale, AZ. It will be the first concert in the venue. We’ve had several “firsts” in new venues with the Stones through the years…and it reminds me some of when we used to have “firsts” back in the 70’s with the Allman Brothers Band. The ABB even opened up the Super Dome in New Orleans back in ‘73, I think it was. Anyway, this is a new facility and it will be fun to be the first band to play it.
Rosie and I took it easy the first part of the day. Our room is overlooking one of the pools of the resort and it was a beautiful sunny day…so we ventured down and soaked up some sun and ordered lunch. I went for an hour-long walk outside the resort afterwards. It was interesting because I noticed there were tons of grapefruit trees in all the yards of the houses where I was walking…in a huge residential section. So apparently this whole area must have been a grapefruit farm at one time. The trees were obviously quite old. There were also quite a lot of olive trees mixed in, so perhaps it had dual purpose. I was tempted to pick some…some of them looked ripe, but most were not quite there yet. I didn’t, though…I didn’t have anything to carry them in. After my walk I went back to get ready to go to the gig. It was quite a long drive from the Phoenician to Glendale, and the traffic was pretty thick…it took us a little over an hour to get there.
In addition to the recent news of Ronnie’s brother Art passing away, we had the sad news that Mick’s dad had a fall and broke three ribs and punctured a lung. Apparently he was not doing well and had developed pneumonia. I can imagine how hard that is on Mick…and he decided to fly to London after the show tonight to be with him. There was talk about if we should move the Las Vegas date, but in the end Mick decided that he would come back. It’s a tough situation. Mr. Jagger is a wonderful man…we’ve met him several times through the years. One can see where Mick gets his vitality. Joe Jagger was born in 1913 and was a physical educational instructor for many years…. and also loved climbing. He even went to Princeton and taught there for a while, meeting the famous Johnny Weissmuller there. Weissmuller was the five time Olympic champion swimmer back in the 20’s that went on to play Tarzan in many films. We all love Mr. Joe and our thoughts and prayers are with him. He’s a tough man and we know he’ll fight hard to make it.
The show went smoothly. We had played here in Glendale last year in the Arena…so I made sure we did quite a few different songs than we did then. It all went down well and the crowd was a good one…. responding strongly to numbers like She Was Hot and Faraway Eyes along with the more well known songs. We’re counting down the shows now, and after tonight we have five left. Tomorrow it’s on to LA for a few days…

11/9,10

Rosie and I hit the pool again before leaving for LA. It feels so good to soak up the sun again after spending the last couple of months in mostly cold climates. I took my walk again…enjoying the desert surroundings and seeing lots of rabbits and quail along the way. Then we joined the group for the departure to the airport and on to the city of the Lost Angels. It was getting dark when we landed, and we loaded up on the bus to take us from the Van Nuys airport to the Four Seasons on Doheny in LA. The bus driver took some strange route that I’m sure was out of the way…and the traffic was horrendous…making for an almost two hour drive. We finally got there and checked in. Rosie was still really down with her cold, bless her heart…and the pressure of the airplane ride didn’t help. But we were glad to be out of planes and busses and went down to the bar for a drink. We saw Blondie there and talked to him a while. He was headed home to Manhattan Beach in a bit. LA is home to quite a lot of people on the tour…Darryl, Bernard, Blondie…and lots of the staff folks as well. I know they are happy to be here, even if for a short few days. We don’t do any shows here for now, though…just working Las Vegas out of LA on the 11th, then move on to Boise and beyond.

We left the bar and walked to Orso, a restaurant not too far from the hotel that we’ve been to many times. It’s always good and convenient to get to. Although we got slightly lost on the way…thinking it was closer than it is. I wound up calling the concierge of the hotel to make sure we were headed in the right direction. They set us straight…it’s on West 3rd a couple of blocks past Robertson Blvd. and we got there in short order. We enjoyed our meal there as we always do, and the service is also consistently good. One of these days I should look back on this journal and write a restaurant travel guide! Hey…it’s part of our everyday lives out here on the road…and we’ve had some great meals in great places…. and some not so good meals, too! Anyway, we got back to the hotel and were not long for bed, being tired from the travel, and Rose Lane needing the rest for her cold.

LA is experiencing a heat wave, and today was no exception. Highs in the lower 90’s, which is very hot for November here. But for us that was good news, as we were happy to get back in the sun. After waking up and having some “morning time”, that’s exactly what we did. It felt good to both of us to have a day off and just veg. But poor Rosie was still suffering from the cold. The sun did her some good, but she was fighting the symptoms…headache, sinus, coughing…all that fun stuff. I was 90% over mine…and decided to arrange for a massage later in the day. I had tried to push some weights when we were in San Francisco and wound up re-injuring my shoulder and neck. Since then I’ve stuck with doing just cardio, trying to get this darn thing healed up…and figured a massage might help it some. It did help a bit…the therapist was very good and was mindful of it…working it but not digging too deep. I just hope it’s not much longer before it mends…I sure miss the workouts. But I guess concentrating on the cardio stuff is not a bad thing.
While we were lying out in the sun, I began to read a book called “A Dog Year” by Jon Katz. I had heard about this book through our daughter Amy. It’s a lovely story and I read half of it today, finding it very hard to put down. It’s based on Katz’s experience in about a year’s time with his two Labrador Retrievers that he had for several years, and two other dogs he acquired in the same year…two Border Collies.

I had found out about the book through our daughter Amy. The irony is that after getting our two Border Collies, Mollie and Maggie, with the help of Charlie Watts, at the end of the last tour, Amy and Steve liked them so much that they bought their own BC, a female that they named Lucy. They bought Lucy through a breeder near Statesboro, Georgia…. and became good friends with them in the process. The breeder called up Amy several months ago to ask her if she would be interested in having Lucy in a movie…called “A Dog Year”, with Jeff Bridges as the star. Indeed they worked it out, and Lucy was sent off to upstate New York for the filming. She was one of 4 different dogs playing the part of the Collies. Apparently it went very well…she was up there for a good three months or so, and news came back to us that Lucy had become the favorite…especially of Bridge’s. Amy and Steve received a great picture of Lucy sitting in Jeff’s lap while he was lying in a hammock. So being curious, Rose Lane and I wanted to read the story. Rosie bought the book when we were in Chicago a while back, and we’ve been carrying it around ever since. She was already reading a couple of other books and she brought it down to the pool for me in case I wanted to start it. I can tell that it will make a great movie, and I’m sure I’ll finish it quickly.
We went to the bar again for a cocktail before going out to eat. The piano player that works there recognized me and stopped to say hello. He’s a good player and a really nice guy…we’ve heard him before as we’ve stayed here so many times through the years. His name is Dana…can’t say what his last name is, but he’s always been very friendly to us. We chatted for a few moments, but he was setting up and didn’t have time to accept our invitation to sit with us.
For dinner we went to the Chaya Brasserie. We’ve been there before a couple of times, but it had been a while. It was as good as we remembered, and we were waited on by a nice young girl named Hope from Tennessee that recognized our accents and took excellent care of us. When we got back to the hotel we checked in on Dana in the bar, and he motioned for me to come sit in, which I did. We played a sort of comical version of Statesboro Blues…the guitar player didn’t quite know the lyrics and was making it up as we went along. I had intended to sing it, but there was no mic at the piano and he took over. Still, the guys could play and it was fun. We didn’t stay beyond that…and went up to the room to crash.

11/11

Well…so much for the heat wave. I got up early and worked on my computer for about an hour…thinking that we’d go lie in the sun again before heading to Vegas…but when I looked out the window it was gray and cloudy. I walked out on the balcony to feel what it was like, and was greeted with a cool, brisk and humid puff of air. Ah, well. No matter, today being a show day we wouldn’t have had a lot of time to lie out anyway. So we turned our attention to our computers for a couple of hours until we got hungry and went down for lunch. We didn’t want to go out and decided to do the cafe in the hotel. Rose Lane didn’t want to come to the show…still feeling the effects of her cold and not wanting to deal with the pressure going up and down in the plane. So after lunch I got myself ready to go, kissing her goodbye and telling her to get some rest.
The flight was short and uneventful…Tim Reis and I sat together and chatted some. We were in Vegas before long and whisked to the stage entrance of the MGM Grand. Tonight our opening act would be Bonnie Raitt…and being friends with her and the entire band, I looked forward to seeing them. We arrived at the venue and settled in to the pre-show routine. I had quite a lot of guests at the Rattlesnake and made the rounds early. One of the first people I saw and wanted to speak to was Jon Cleary, Bonnie’s keyboard player and a good friend. We had a nice reunion and talked “shop” for a while. Eventually I saw all the other members of Bonnie’s band…Hutch Hutchinson, George Marinelli, Rickie Fataar, and of course Bonnie. It was so great to have them with us, and they will also open up in LA at Dodger Stadium and on our last show in Vancouver.
Others that I had at the show included Jack Morgan, our friend and a Charlane client; Larry Johnson and his sister Libby; and David Peck, who has been releasing some wonderful DVD packages lately…one is a big box set of various Jazz artists called “Jazz Icons”, and one on Smokey Robinson as well as one on Marvin Gaye. His company, Reelin’ In The Years (www.reelinintheyears.com) do a fabulous job with these wonderful packages.
After the social duties we got down to biz and had a short rehearsal in Keith’s room, then the gig itself. This turned out to be one of our very best shows in a long time. I don’t know why…but the stars lined up and the band was swingin’ from the beginning. We seemed to all be a notch above the norm, and it felt great to have such a good, tight show. Afterwards we were hustled out and back to the plane…and flown back to Van Nuys airport in LA. I walked back in the hotel room about 2am. Rose Lane was asleep, but I stayed up a while watching TV and unwinding before sneaking in beside her.

11/12

Pretty uneventful off day in LA. We did the pool thing for a couple of hours, then eventually made our way to The Beverly Center to kill some time. We thought we might go to one of the movies showing there, but in the end we just walked around and came back to the hotel in the evening. Dinner was at the Bombay Palace, a good Indian restaurant a couple of miles from the Four Seasons. We had the place just about all to ourselves…very quiet. Then we went back to pack….tomorrow we head to Boise.

11/3

The rest did me some good, and I felt better upon getting up and stirring around some. I felt good enough to do some exercise and hit the gym for a bit after a little wake up period, trying to be mindful of my still injured shoulder. We would be moving over to the Four Seasons in the afternoon, about 3. So Rosie and I had a bite to eat after my gym hit and killed time until the move. At the appointed hour we made the short walk to the Four Seasons and checked in. We got settled in room 1724 and rested up a bit.

I had talked to Jimmy Dillon a couple of times, and we had made plans for dinner. He had some meeting to attend from 7 to 8, so we looked to meet him at the hotel after that. In the meantime, Rose Lane and I went down to the bar to have a drink about 7:30 or so. As I had thought might be the case, our friend Michael Udelson was in the bar playing the piano. When we were here almost exactly a year ago, we had seen him and I had played with him a bit a couple of nights. Michael is an excellent player and a great guy, and it was wonderful to see him again. I immediately sat down with him and said hello…and we played a blues together while we were waiting on our drinks. Jimmy met us soon, and I introduced him to Michael. We all talked for a while and then we bid goodbye to Michael and headed to the Tadish Grill for dinner. Rosie and I have eaten there before…it’s a nice place with simple but good fare. They don’t take reservations, though…and we had a short wait to get a table. The three of us had a great time…Jimmy telling us about his recent endeavors and his family…we have met most all of them before…his mother is a very special person and we asked bout her. We also filled him in on our adventures while we dined.
We walked back to the hotel after and said goodnight to Jimmy, heading up to bed.

11/4

My cold had passed on to Rose Lane, unfortunately…and today I felt that it had come back on me, making me feel a bit worse than I had the day before. So we took it easy the first part of the day, staying in a resting some. Jimmy had called us and invited to pick us up with his friend Tara and get out and about some. So after a very expensive and not so great lunch at the Four Seasons restaurant (70 bucks for pancakes and bacon for me and some soup for Rosie…both highly average at best), we met them and went out. We first went to the Fisherman’s Wharf area…but it was really crowded and we could tell it would be a mess….so we bailed out of that and headed to a nice area, Union Street. There we walked about, checking out the various shops and just wandering here and there. Rose Lane bought some candles and other little items, but that was about it. We hung around for an hour or so, then Jimmy wanted to go to a guitar shop that he knew and we went along. It was a small shop…with a good many guitars on display…but nothing that I thought was all that interesting or amazing. Jimmy introduced us to some of the guys working there…very nice cats that were complimentary to me. We didn’t stay all that long…just 15 minutes or so, then headed back to the hotel. That was about all Rosie and I could handle feeling the way we did, and we gave our thanks to Jimmy and Tara and went up to the room to rest and relax. I checked with the Tour Office on some details concerning our recent changes in the schedule and was given the sad news that Ronnie’s brother Art had died.
11/5

When we got up I made a point of sending out for a copy of the Sunday Sacramento Bee newspaper. Our friend Tom Knudeson that is a two time Nobel Prize winning journalist for the Bee had finished writing his article on me a few days ago and it came out today…on the front page. He did a superb job on it….articulating our story in his fine style and well written lines. I couldn’t have been more pleased with it. I immediately sent him a thank you email and sent some online copies of the article to a few friends and associates. You can check it out at: http://www.sacbee.com/122/story/71950.html
Well done and thanks, Tom!

My friends from Boston, Steve Kramph and Rob Friedman that own Chestnut Hill Sound… and that are launching a new audio product soon that I am involved with… are in town. They are having some meetings with Apple and others about the launch, and wanted to meet with me as well. I had arranged to meet with them around 3 and to go to dinner with them at their friend Larry Petersen’s house in the evening. Larry works with the Monster Cable Company but is also involved with CHS’s new product. Rose Lane was feeling pretty bad with her cold, but I was getting over mine. In the morning we laid in and dealt with emails and other communications, then walked over to the Westfield Mall that is only three blocks from the hotel. There is a large food court there and we got some chili to eat and walked around some. I went back to the room to get ready to meet Steve and Rob while Rosie looked around some more. She came back shortly afterwards, though…and laid in the bed some to rest and nurse her cold. Steve and Rob showed up and we had a great talk about the product and the launch. I can’t say any more about it now, as we are planning on some official announcements before too long… but I am very excited about it and look forward to working with them on the project.

After our discussion we headed over to Larry’s house in Oakland Hills. Rose Lane was of course invited…but feeling as badly as she did she opted to stay at the hotel and rest. We arrived at Larry’s place just at sunset, and his patio offered a fantastic view of the Bay. Introductions were made and his wife Madeline brought us all some Chardonnay to sip while watching the sun fades over the Bay and the lights sparkle into the night. Beautiful setting. Madeline took me on a tour of their lovely house, and then we met back up with all the others for some conversation and more wine before dinner. Larry cooked some steaks on the grill and eventually we all sat down for dinner. Madeline had made some great accouterments to go along with the steaks, and it was indeed a first class meal with first class company. We hung around for an hour or so after dinner…watching some of the football game that Larry had saved on his Tivo and continuing our conversations about various subjects. Finally it was time to go, and after thanking our hosts, Steve and Rob drove me back to the Four Seasons. Rose Lane was up but in the bed…still feeling poorly. I was pretty tired myself and we both turned in in short order.

11/6

Show day for McAfee stadium in Oakland. We played two shows here almost exactly a year ago…but in San Francisco. This time it will be for Oakland. After the usual morning/afternoon routine I took the early van to the gig. I wrote up the set list, making sure we didn’t do too many repeats of our two shows last year. Last time we began with Start Me Up on both shows, so I put JJ Flash as the opener. I included songs that we didn’t do before like She Was Hot, Dead Flowers, Let’s Spend The Night Together, Bitch, Streets Of Love, Under My Thumb and Just My Imagination. Keith put two different tunes in..You Got The Silver and Connection, so that made for quite a different set than a year ago. Before we had Dead Flowers on the set, Mick and I had Little Red Rooster in there as a duet with Van Morrison, who was opening up for us. We even went over LLR in Keith’s dressing room with a small set up. But just before the show Van copped out and left, so we replaced Rooster with Flowers. After our short rehearsal, I met our friends in the Rattlesnake…including Steve Kramph, Rob Friedman and the Petersens; Dave James (who works for Farrari-Carano Vineyards) and his family; Jim Carlton (writer for the Wall Street Journal) and his friends; and Jim and Betty Doerksen and their friends. Rose Lane and I served for three years with Jim and Betty on the American Tree Farm Operating Committee.

After doing the social duties I got dressed and geared up for the show. The gig went really well…up to Connection. We were unclear on the arrangement, and as a result it was quite a mess. But we got through it, and it was the only real problem of the night…well, I do recall the ending of Under My Thumb was somewhat “confused”…anyway, overall it was a great gig. I think it helped that we had done the Beacon shows and had a break from the stadium vibe for a while. It made for a fresh feel to the show.
Back at the hotel I went down to see my pal Michael Udelson play the piano for just a little while. I sat in on a couple of numbers with him and then said goodbye to him as I had to go up and deal with the packing for tomorrow’s leave. Rose Lane was still feeling crummy and after the packing she went right to bed, poor thing. I wasn’t far behind her, though.

10/23-26 THE REHEARSALS

We left Austin on the 23rd for NY to begin rehearsals on the following day, the 24th. Arriving in NY at LaGuardia around 8pm, we headed into Manhattan. We are staying again at the Palace hotel, on Madison between 50th and 51st streets, Midtown. I had arranged to have dinner with Eric Wold, a representative of the Octagon Speaker’s Bureau out of the Washington, DC area. I had met Eric a couple of years ago when he was with the SFX Agency and we had almost done some business, but then SFX had some major changes, being bought out by Clear Channel…and as a result Eric moved on to Octagon. We had lost touch for a while, then he contacted me recently to tell me of his changes and to say he’d like to get together and discuss booking some speeches for me. Our flight had taken longer than I had expected and upon arrival I called him to move our dinner up an hour or so to around 9:30. It was a bit ironic, as he was at the Guilt Bar of the Palace having a drink with our friend Ann Venneman, the former Secretary of Agriculture and now head of UNICEF. I asked if she could come to dinner, but she had a conflict and had to pass. A shame, as we would both loved to have seen her.
Our room this time at the Palace was on the 41st floor in the Towers section of the hotel, where we usually stay. We were in a corner room and had arranged for an adjacent connecting room for Amy, Steve and Miles as they were coming up from Atlanta on Friday to join us and would use that room. Ashley would also come down from Boston the day after them, on Saturday. We settled in the room and it wasn’t long before our dinner engagement with Eric. He had booked a table for us at Maloney and Porcelli, a really great grill restaurant right next door to the Palace. We met Eric at the Guilt bar and walked to the restaurant. It was great to see him, and I was glad to be re-connected. Maloney and Porcelli offers some of the very best steaks in New York, and we all went for one. While we waited on dinner to arrive, we had a cocktail and caught up with things…he wanting to know about our tour and other recent doings, me wanting to know about the agency and how we might work together on some things. Most of my speeches are given to groups connected to environmental or forestry issues, and we discussed getting me some other type of engagements outside of that realm, which I would love to do. Eric is a great guy, and our discussion was exciting and hopeful. Dinner was excellent… and the wine soothing and tasty. We wrapped things up and bit goodbye to Eric…he was going to try and make our Atlantic City show that was scheduled in a few days and promised him passes if he could make it.
Rosie and I went back to relax for a while and deal with unpacking our bags. We had vowed to unpack everything and make arrangements to send back a good bit of what we had to lighten our load for the last month of the tour. Then it was to bed.
The next day we went through our usual routine…setting up our coffee maker and sipping some brew, going through emails and doing more unpacking. We had a good bit of dirty clothes and decided it would be a good time to sort them out and take them to a laundry, which we did. We had some lunch and then it was getting close to time for me to head over for the first rehearsal at the Beacon.

These are some very important shows…being filmed by Martin Scorsese…and are our only theater shows of the tour. It offers the band a great opportunity and Mick and I had been working for a couple of months on some ideas for the set lists. He had also told me about three special guests that would be performing with us…Jack White of the White Stripes and a respected producer/solo artist; Buddy Guy, the blues great; and Christina Aguilera. We had discussed some song options for them, but had not yet settled on exactly what we’d do with them. They would not come in for a few days, though…so today we would mostly concentrate on tunes for us. The Beacon is a wonderful historic theater…and of course I have played there many times with the Allman Brothers Band as a guest during their annual run. I’ve also played there with Gov’t Mule. It’s truly a beautiful place. When I arrived, the first thing to notice was all the huge 35mm film cameras that Scorsese had in the room…some of them on huge cranes or on tracks. I found out later that there was some 17 or more of them. The other thing was the number of working personnel that he had brought with him…wow, there must have been a hundred or so…they were all over the theater, manning the cameras (some cameras had five or six people working them), taking notes, carrying slates, moving other equipment around…it was like a team of ants at work! Looks like Scorsese had come to do serious business!
My dressing room was up on the sixth floor. There is only one little tiny elevator to service all the floors, and I knew I would be doing a lot of walking up and down the stairs over the coming days. I got to my room and set up my computer, going through all the notes that Mick and I had discussed about the tunes. I made some chord charts for some of them that we had never played before and began to make a list of what I thought we might should start with. After that I went down to the stage to check out the setup. I wasn’t totally happy with my stage position and went to find Patrick Woodroffe to discuss what we could do to remedy the situation. He was amenable to me shifting some and perhaps putting up a riser…and we went to discuss this with the stage and production folks. But no one wanted to make a change until Mick saw what we had, which I understood. When he got there I had a chance to discuss it with him, and he totally agreed, as the way it was at present it was such that he and I could not see each other. But the crew asked if we could save the change for the next day as it would take them some time to re-arrange everything. I agreed to that and we started the rehearsals. We went through a number of the songs that Mick and I had talked about…Loving Cup, Let It Rock, Shattered, Mr. Pitiful, Fool To Cry, a Muddy Waters blues tune called Champagne and Reefer, She Was Hot, Back of My Hand and some others. It went quite well and during the course of all of this the camera folks were getting comfortable with their movements and getting to hear the songs for the first time. Scorsese had been begging for a set list for six weeks or so…but Mick and I knew that we wouldn’t be able to decide on a lot of it until we got in there and tried things out. We did manage to get him some 10 songs or so that we felt were solid ones to be played…Sympathy, JJ Flash, Satisfaction, Tumbling Dice, Start Me Up, Honky Tonk Women…the obvious ones. Anyway, we were all working away and things progressed nicely. It was a good first day.

The next day I had made an appointment with our tour Doctor, Brad Connor, to have an endoscopy. Brad is a gastrointestinal specialist, and has been out on tour with us quite a bit over the past year and a half. There have been other Doctors out with us when Brad can’t make it…he has a practice in NY and can’t travel with us all the time. He has contacts throughout the world of other fine Doctors, and when he can’t be with us he has others do the shift with the band. It’s a comforting thing to have a Dr. on hand at all times with us on the tour. We have become good friends with Brad and some of the others over the course of the tour. Brad and I had several conversations about my particular condition of Barrette’s Disease, and had suggested we do this at his facility since it has been about five years since I had one. I walked to his office from the hotel and got there at noon. After the usual forms to fill out and a bit of waiting, I was taken down for the procedure. Basically it involves putting a small cable with a camera on it down the throat into the stomach. The camera records the condition of the esophagus and a small device can take samples of the tissue along the way to be analyzed. It’s a bit uncomfortable (while I was given a mild relaxant, I was not completely anesthetized), but not all that bad. After a short recovery time of about fifteen minutes I was let go. Rose Lane had come to check on me and go with me back to the hotel. We went back together and I prepared to head down to the Beacon for the day’s work.

As far as the rehearsals, this day was similar…we repeated most all the songs we had done the day before, allowing Scorsese’s team to get more familiar with the songs. Mick and I had met and discussed what we thought was working and started to home in on the songs for the guests. I had first suggested Fool To Cry for Aguilera….and while he liked the idea, he wanted to do something more up-tempo with her…so I suggested Live With Me. We had done it once with Sheryl Crow a couple of tours back in Miami, and it made for a cool duet. He liked that idea, so we agreed that it was a likely one for her. I had suggested Loving Cup or Factory Girl for Jack White…and he favored Loving Cup…so we penciled that one in for him. Champagne and Reefer seemed a good choice for Buddy Guy…although I suggested Muddy’s Trouble No More as an alternative. But Mick preferred the former. We toiled away at these and other songs…Keith wanted to try some things and we played Connection, You Got The Silver, Slipping Away, Can’t Be Seen With You and Little T and A. All was going well…but one thing that bothered me was that Mick was still coming off some problems with his voice that had started a week or two back…and along with rehearsing the music he was also having to deal with the production, meeting with Martin and all his crew, scheduling other meetings. It seemed to me he had too much going on…and it was beginning to show.
On the third day of rehearsals it became even more apparent. I could tell he was trying to hold back and not over sing…but could also hear the strain in his voice. I believe he also had some little viral thing going on…a cold or some allergy or something. But we all kept up the pace, adding in some more songs here and there but also focusing on the ones that we felt were working. I had spoken with Mick on the phone about a draft set list, and we were coming close to having it together. We went through All Down The Line, As Tears Go By, Just My Imagination, I’m Free, Sympathy, JJ Flash, and some of the others. I had campaigned for Rip This Joint, Too Much Blood, 19th Nervous Breakdown, Dear Doctor, Moonlight Mile, Let Me Go, Crazy Mama….some of the new tunes like Laugh, I Nearly Died and Neo Con… and more, but it was becoming apparent that there just wasn’t enough time to try them and we would have to go with what we had. Mick left a bit early and we went through several of Keith’s songs afterwards, calling it a night around 11:30.

10/27, 28

This was to be a hit and run show day with us going to Atlantic City and back. Also, Amy and company would be arriving this evening. They were going to skip the show…Rose Lane was going to stay behind and get up with them and baby sit while they visited a friend, and I did the show. I had an important phone call scheduled for noon to speak with Curt Soper, the Director of the Georgia Land Conservation Program. I am on the Board of the Conservation Council and he had some news to discuss with me about some projects that were coming through the system. I took care of that and shortly afterwards the phone rang and it was Arnold Dunn…telling me that the show had been cancelled due to Mick’s stressed voice. I wasn’t surprised, but had thought that Mick may have tried to go through with it in order to prevent further cancellations…but he had made the right choice, because these Beacon shows are so important for us. Arnold said they would re-schedule the Atlantic City show and move some dates around to try and keep from losing any shows. But I knew that we would have to lose something…sure enough, while they were able to re-schedule AC for Nov 17th, that would mean we would have to move the Dodger stadium show in LA to Nov 22nd…and lose the show in Hawaii. What a drag, as Rose Lane and I were going to enjoy a few days on the beach after the Honolulu show before heading home. Ah well, that’s the nature of rock and roll.
So now I had the day off. To be honest, I was beginning to feel a little stressed myself from the rehearsals. We had been working ten hours a day for the past three days and I think we were all feeling it a little.
So the Bransfords arrived in the afternoon, and of course we were thrilled to see all of them…and to hold Miles in our arms again. He’s grown soooo much (as babies are prone to do!), and they all looked great. Amy and Steve wanted to keep their visit with their friend which was fine, and Rose Lane and I wound up baby sitting…staying in the room and ordering up room service for dinner. It was glorious to have the time with Miles…and he took to us just fine. We played with him, walked him around, fed him and just reveled in his company. That lifted our spirits. We put him to bed about 8:30…and put ourselves to bed around midnight.

This is Steve’s birthday. Since it had been planned as a day off, we had decided we’d all go out to dinner together. Ashley was coming in and we had hoped she would be able to join us, but she called to say her flight had been canceled and she wouldn’t be able to get to NY until pretty late…10pm or so. We discussed several places for dinner and settled on Oceana, a high-end seafood restaurant not too far from the hotel. But before that, we had a nice day doing our own things. I went to the gym for a while…even though I still was nursing my sore shoulder and didn’t do weights, I got on the treadmill for a good solid hour. Amy and Steve had a friend of theirs coming over…a girl named Alex that went to school with Amy when she was at Breneau for her senior year of high school. Alex had a baby boy as well, about 10 months old. It was fun to watch the two kids check each other out and play a little. Of course they are very young and can’t really go at it, but they did pass some stares and throw some toys around which was very cute. After they left, we just fooled around some until dinnertime. We had arranged for a baby sitter, so Miles was left behind and it was an adult night out.
Knowing that Ashley would be arriving soon, we went back to the room to wait on her. She came in pretty late…some time after 11. Miles’ crib was in the hallway between our adjoining rooms and when she entered he woke up for a second, allowing her to pick him up. Of course she loved this….but it didn’t last long as at that point Amy was pretty tired and after a short greeting she and Steve went to bed, taking Miles into their room. Ashley, Rose Lane and I stayed up for another couple of hours talking and enjoying each other’s company before finally putting our heads on the pillows. We had put in a roll away bed for Ashley in the sitting room…and bid her good night heading to our own bed.

10/29

The first Beacon show. Amy and Steve had gone out early, so it was Ash, RL and me that spent the mid morning and early afternoon together. I had to leave for the show at 3, but that gave me time to spend with them for a while. I had to arrange for some tickets for friends and associates and dealt with that via phone and emails. I had met up with Jay Carson, an assistant to former President Bill Clinton during our rehearsals. Jay is from Macon, Ga. and he had a few extra tickets that he let me have. That helped a lot as I had tons of requests and very few tickets from the band that I could deal with. After getting that taken care of I headed down to the gig. We had rehearsed with Buddy Guy but had not yet rehearsed with Christina or Jack. So after a couple of warm up numbers, we did the tunes with them. All seemed to go pretty well. Mick was hanging in there with his voice, but was still having trouble…so he got Bernard to do the vocals during the sound check/rehearsal. After that I went to finalize the set list with Mick. We put that together and turned it in to everyone, satisfied that we had something different and fun to deal with. The set looked like this:

Start Me Up
Shattered
She Was Hot
All Down the Line
Loving Cup (with Jack White)
As Tears Go By
I’m Free
Undercover of The Night
Just My Imagination
Shine A Light
Champagne & Reefer (with Buddy Guy)
Tumbling’ Dice
You Got The Silver
Little T and A
Sympathy
Live With Me (with Christina Aguilera)
??
Start Me Up
Brown Sugar
Satisfaction

This would be in part a fundraiser for the Clinton Foundation. President Clinton was there…and after Buddy Guy opened up, he took the stage and gave a short speech. I had hoped to catch it, but with all that was going on backstage I just couldn’t make it. I had also hoped to get a handshake/photo op with him, but that wasn’t in the cards either. We took the stage and the show went quite well…although there was no doubt that Mick was still struggling to an extent. But he managed to put out amazing energy and all in all it was a fun, interesting and winning set. Buddy Guy seemed to be a little lost on his tune and there were other problems with the arrangement on that song…and there were one or two smaller blips here and there but nothing too major. Under all the circumstances, we declared victory!
One unfortunate thing that happened before the show started was that Ahmet Ertegen, the famous producer and one of the founders of Atlantic Records had come to see the band…and while he was in the Rattlesnake Inn, he tripped and fell, hitting his head hard on the concrete floor. Ahmet is in his 80’s…. and this was a serious injury. He was rushed to the hospital. Ahmet is a legend that we all love and respect, and we certainly hope he’ll recover from this.
Back at the hotel we had some drinks downstairs…although the hotel had screwed up by closing the Guilt bar for a private function and being Sunday night their other bars were closed as well. So our representative, Karen Gault, shook the bushes some and got them to finally bring out some beer and wine that they served in the lobby for us. Jeff Bransford, Steve’s brother, and some of his friends…including Diego Weingardner and his wife (we have known Diego for a few years through Jeff and Steve…very nice fellow) and others were there. My old pal Robbie Clyne, who owns an ad agency in Nashville that handles lots of musical instrument and pro audio clients happened to be in town and I was able to get him a ticket…so he was with us, too. So was Herren Hickingbotham, who was in town with his dad Frank. Herren had also come to the show…and had invited us all out to dinner with his dad the next day. So we all had a great time talking about the show and other topics and just relaxing. Finally it was time to call it a night and we headed up to bed.

10/30

Although we had a pretty late night, we had arranged for our lunch with Herren and his dad at noon at Bice, a nice and well known Italian restaurant. So we didn’t have as much time as we would have liked for a slow wake up, but still managed to down some coffee and have a little time to hang before showering and heading out to meet them.

Mr. Frank and Herren were already there and we had a great reunion. Rose Lane and I have not seen Mr. Frank in quite some time…he is truly a wonderful man and we have great respect for him and of course for Herren and family, who are some of our very best friends in the world. Frank Hickingbotham is an amazing entrepreneur. Along with Herren many years ago, they bought the TCBY frozen yogurt company and took it to great heights before selling it to the Mrs. Fields company some years ago. Along with that success, they have amassed many high end car dealerships in the West…handling Rolls Royce, Bentley, Mercedes, Infinity and other lines. They also have several Harley Davidson dealerships. But the reason they were in NY was to participate in the closing bell at NASDAQ as part of an IPO for their Home Bank companies…a group of banks in Florida and Arkansas that has recently gone public. This would be the first time that Mr. Frank has met Ashley, Amy, Steve and Miles. He seemed to genuinely love the family atmosphere and was as gracious as ever to us.
After parting with them; Rosie, Ashley and I went to see our friend Ronnie Finestone at Andrew Marc. We had made an appointment with him to see some of their fine jackets and coats…as a matter of fact, we had already had a beautiful coat held for Ashley that we had seen at Sax in Boston some months before. I called Ronnie to ask him if he could hold me one for her, and he kindly did so. The Bransfords made their way back to the hotel to rest while we took a cab to AM. When we got there we had a nice chat with Ronnie…he had come to the show the night before with his daughter Cat with a pair of the Clinton tickets I had scored. Also there was Jacqui Argetta who also works at AM and who Rose Lane and I had met before when we were first there about a year ago. After shooting the breeze for a bit we got down to work and had a look at the line. Ronnie pulled out the coat for Ashley, and it looked magnificent on her. I tried out several jackets and wound up with three really cool ones…two that are leather “jacket shirts”…one dark brown and one black, and one brown motorcycle jacket…all of which seemed to be waiting on me to own. We did some minor tailoring with their fine tailor Ulysses…. a really nice guy from Italy that asked us about our experience there on the recent European tour. Ronnie said he should be able to have it all ready in a day or two…. and after thanking he and Jacqui for their taking such good care of us we hit the streets again. Ash had a flight back to Boston, but we had enough time to walk around a bit, which we did before seeing her off.
Back at the Palace we met back up with Amy, Steve and Miles. Amy and Steve wanted to go out to eat early, but Rosie and I wanted to wait a while…so they went ahead and Rosie and I wound up going to a nice Vietnamese style place called Le Colonial. We had a good meal there and headed back to the hotel where we spent some time with Amy and Steve before saying goodnight and heading to bed.

10/31

We woke up to some surprising news…that there would be no show at the Beacon tonight. This was again due to Mick and his vocal troubles. I know it had to be a tough decision on his part, but no doubt it was best to put it off a night so that he could be in better shape for the show. This meant that we had an unexpected day off. We told Amy and Steve the news, and they started checking on changing their flights as they had planned on leaving the next day…but wanted to see the show. They were able to work it out, and we were able to keep the room for an extra day, so things worked out. After sorting all that out we all hit the streets. It was getting to be laundry time again, so we put all that together and ventured out to the place we had used a few days before. On the way we stopped for lunch, having light fare of salads. Then we dropped off the laundry and decided to go up towards the middle 70 streets on Madison where some nice shops are.
We walked along for a while and finally caught a cab up to around 72nd St. Finally Steve and I branched off with Miles and walked back to the hotel while Rose Lane and Amy strolled out on their own for a while. When I got back to the hotel I had a message from our friend Richard Kerris from the Apple computer company. He was in town for business and was open for dinner…so we invited him to go with us. We decided to stay close to “home” and go to Maloney and Porcelli again.

Amy and Steve wanted to go down to the Village to watch part of the Halloween parade and had arranged for a baby sitter for Miles. We met up with Richard about 8pm and enjoyed catching up with him. He and his wife Nat have two little girls together, Scarlett and Madeline…and Nat apparently had her hands full with them doing Halloween back home in California. We talked about family, the tour, and the fact that we would be winding up soon and heading home…and we talked some about Apple and how cool the new computers and other products are. It’s always great to see Richard…he’s a good friend and we enjoy his company.
After we wrapped up dinner we said goodbye to him and went back to the room. Amy and Steve returned after a bit and we had a nice time talking a little before we all called it a night.

11/1

Rosie and I were up by about 9. After sipping coffee for a while, I went down to the gym for a bit; spending an hour on the treadmill and doing some lightweights…I’m still feeling my sore shoulder and trying to take it easy. Ronnie Finestone had sent me an email to say that my Andrew Marc leather jackets were ready, so after the exercise I showered and walked over to his showroom to pick them up. They did a great job on them and I was very happy with the fit. Ronnie and I talked for a while, and then I thanked him and left, walking back to the room. We were to have a sound check today, and would leave for the Beacon at 3. Rose Lane, Ashley and Steve would come later. At the Beacon I went through the set list, thinking about what changes we might make, but not knowing what shape Mick was in I didn’t want to get too deep into it until I could meet with him. When we all got to the stage for the sound check, I had a little time with him and could tell that we would not be able to get too adventurous and would need to make it as easy as possible for him. During the sound check we again got Bernard to stand in for Mick so he could save his voice for the show. After meeting with him in his dressing room, we decided we would change up a few things…and the set looked like this:

JJ Flash
Shattered
She Was Hot
All Down The Line
Loving Cup (with Jack White)
As Tears Go By
I’m Free
Some Girls
Just My Imagination
Far Away Eyes
Champagne & Reefer (with Buddy Guy)
Tumbling’ Dice
You Got The Silver
Connection
Sympathy
Live With Me (with Christina Aguilera)
Honky Tonk Woman
Start Me Up
Brown Sugar
Satisfaction

Being that we were supposed to play last night…on Halloween…some folks dressed up in costumes anyway, although this was the first of November. Amy and Steve had dressed up Miles to look like Keith…with a bandana headband, a black muscle t-shirt that said “Keef” on it…a tiny skull and crossbones necklace and a little silver chain hanging on his pants.
It was really a hoot, and they were able to get a wonderful photo op with Keith. It made for great fun, and everyone loved seeing him in his costume. Amy and Steve had arranged for a babysitter and before the show started they took Miles back to the hotel, then returned to the Beacon to see the show. It turned out to be a good one…Mick was in better shape than he was for the first show, and for the most part it was better overall. It was more relaxed, flowed nicely and we all felt more comfortable. I would imagine that most of what Scorsese will use will come from this night…but there was some good stuff from the first one, too…and no doubt it will wind up a mixture of the two.
During both nights there were quite a lot of celebrities and familiar faces in the audience…. the Clintons, of course…and folks like Lauren Hutton, Michael J. Fox, Paul Shaffer, Angelica Houston, Michael Stipe of REM, Sheryl Crow, and others.
It was neat to see them there, and all seemed to have a wonderful time. Both shows will go down in the books as some of the most memorable Stones show ever.
Feeling pretty exhausted after the gig, and having to deal with the packing before going to bed, we chose not to go down to the bar when we got back to the hotel. Amy and Steve did go down for a bit, but Rosie and I stayed in. It took us a while to get our bags sorted out…Amy had offered to take one bag home for us so that we could lighten our load, and we put clothes in there that we felt we wouldn’t really need. We also set aside some items to be boxed up and sent back home…so all this made for a longer than usual pack up. We finally finished up about 3am and put ourselves between the sheets.

11/2

The Bransfords had to leave the hotel by about 9am in order to catch their flight home…and we had told them to come in and wake us up before they left. They did…which gave us a change to give them and Miles one last hug before we were parted. Little Miles cried a bit after we hugged him…and while I’m not sure why, it made us feel like maybe he was sad to leave his grandparents…. it was probably more like he had a wet diaper, but hey…we’ll stick with the former! They headed out the door and Rose Lane and I lay in bed for a while…but not long. We got up and piddled around with final zipping up of bags, checking emails, having coffee and such until it was time for us to settle up our bill and meet everyone in the lobby and head out of NY for San Francisco. I had begun to feel like I was catching a cold in the last couple of days…and today I could tell it was getting me. My throat was scratchy, sinuses stopped up and I had a low grade headache. Ah well, I’ve managed to get through most all the tour without being sick, and guess it’s time to pay some dues.
We were in the air and winging our way to the West Coast by 4pm. It was quite a long flight, and gave me time to work on this journal as well as catch a bit of rest. Due to Mick’s vocal problems we had moved some dates around…and were originally supposed to be flying to Vancouver today…but that show had been moved to Nov 25th and our Oakland show would be moved one day from Nov 5th to Nov 6th. This caused me to have to cancel the benefit gig at Bimbo’s with Jimmy Dillon, which was a drag. Jimmy had tried to move it from the 6th to the 5th, but unfortunately the club was not available and we had to cancel it. Jimmy said he would try to make it up by re-scheduling it after the new year, so I’ll keep my fingers crossed it works out.
Our plane landed at the Oakland airport in the early evening. We were pretty burnt out from all the stress and activity of our NY stay, and my cold was in full swing…making me feel tired and wasted. We were taken to the St. Regis Hotel….we usually stay at the Four Seasons, but they were sold out for the night and some of us were put in the St. Regis which is only about 4 blocks from the Seasons. It was a nice place, and after checking into our room we went down to sort out dinner. Not having the energy to go out, we opted for the hotel restaurant. It was fine, although with my cold I couldn’t taste much. Afterwards we went straight back to the room and I hit the bed in short order to get some much needed rest.