This was definitely an epic, summer weekend in pictures for sure! Friday night I was at The Sussex County Fairgrounds for the Rock, Ribs & Ridges concert. This is a tradition that many go to every year, some come all the way up from Florida! It's fun running into so many old friends while making new ones too. We were able to meet our NNJ Backstage winners Nancy and Steve. They're a very sweet couple, and I'm happy that they won. I hope they'll never forget getting to take pictures on stage right before the concert. Thursday we dropped of the NNJ Jeep Wrangler at The Sussex County Fairgrounds for the weekend, and you could already smell the delicious barbecue as everyone was starting to set up their equipment. The weather held off in our favor, 70 degrees out felt like 50 after our heat wave earlier last week. I'm very grateful that the heat wave didn't extend at The Fairgrounds, where you can definitely get scorched for sure. I had delicious ribs from Smoking Mo's Southern BBQ. This is where I want to get on my soapbox and teach everyone that it drives me insane when people refer to a cookout as a BBQ. Barbecue is not a cookout, it is a type of food. If you're doing burgers, hot dogs, steak, that is a cookout, not a barbecue. If you're doing ribs, pulled pork, etc? Then you can absolutely call it a barbecue. I'll be right over!
Orleans kicked off the festival with a terrific sounding set. I've heard songs like "Dancing In The Moonlight," and "Still The One," my whole life but it was really neat hearing it live in person for my first time. I ran into my friend Bill Snouffer from Nielsen Automotive Group after their set and we both agreed that they were tremendous. When I told Bill that I knew probably 3-4 songs that they did, Bill joked "wait, you're the radio guy! You should know ALL of their songs." LOL. Sorry, I'm only 43! My bestie Brad had a perfect quote. At one point he said "It feels like I'm in the backseat of my Mom's station wagon, in the 70s, and we're cranking this on our AM Radio!" Everyone agreed that quote was perfect. I had fun hanging with work wife bestie Shawn, and also besties Christine and Chris. Atlanta Rhythm Section came on after them and were sounding great too. I didn't realize that their hit song "Spooky," was by them. This was another example of how I have heard this song so many times on the radio my whole life, but then getting to hear it in person was fun and honestly surreal. Overall we had a wonderful Friday night. I looked at besties Brad, Christine and Chris, and said "not a bad way at all to start off the weekend, right?" We did a quick cheers and everyone agreed it was a great start to the weekend.
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Saturday morning I went to breakfast at Crystal Cafe in Vernon with besties Artie, Margie, Roy, George, and Kathy. We had a great time with several laughs. Just what the doctor ordered when I'm working most of the weekend. My meal was good and hearty, just what the doctor ordered before a fun, long day at The Sussex County Fairgrounds. I was there around 1:30 for day 2 of Rock, Ribs & Ridges. I ran over to congratulate our friend Borasio who did a great job emceeing all weekend. When you're the emcee for Rock, Ribs & Ridges you are basically camped out there all weekend long. It's a lot of hard work and he did great. He then told me the bad news that Saturday night headliner Grand Funk Railroad was running late and having trouble flying out of Georgia due to intense thunderstorms. I then went over and enjoyed the show with besties Brad, Christine and Chris. I arrived just in time to see Matt Coffy wrap up his set. He's been an opening for Rock, Ribs & Ridges several times. We then enjoyed a fun set from Six Gun Sally, who were very lively. I then checked in with Borasio who updated me that Grand Funk Railroad was trying hard but still weren't able to get out of Georgia. While this was happening, The Rock Ribs & Ridges team scrambled and did a great job getting The Allman Brothers cover band "Live At The Fillmore," and were able to sub in for Grand Funk Railroad. Travelling can be tough. There are so many moving parts with concerts that we often don't even think about at all.
Artimus Pyle Band is always so much fun every year. It's great seeing that Hall Of Fame drum set, and they had Bo Bice from American Idol as their lead singer. I hope they stay together, Bo Bice sounded absolutely perfect with them. He went on a little later than scheduled to try and help bridge the gap as folks were waiting for the band to arrive from Philadelphia. Brad looked at me before their set and said "do you think they'll now do a 25 minute rendition of Free Bird to try and stretch / stall given the situation?" I cracked up and said we can't rule anything out at this point. We actually timed out how long their Free Bird rendition was and they almost hit 12 minutes exactly, including a 4 minute long guitar solo. We cracked up timing how long they would go on with the song, which sounded fantastic.
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Sunday I took bestie Jasen to my heaven on Earth happy place, the Vista 180 Pool at Crystal Springs. We luckily ran into besties Margie and Artie, they were able to help us get the only two seats left and in the shade. They were packed. Busiest day of the year so far for them, and they handled the crowd tremendously. With the awful weather we've had the past few months, everyone was out and enjoying all of the beautiful weather they could.
It was so relaxing and peaceful. Many people around us admitted that they were just trying to extend their vacations there for just a couple more hours. I can't blame them at all.
Sunday night Brad texted me that he just got to Minerals Tiki bar after his third day of Rock, Ribs & Ridges. We enjoyed a nightcap together, recapping all of the fun we had this weekend.
I had a wonderful weekend that included tons of sun, including me getting slightly scorched on Saturday. We were better prepared for the expected thunderstorm that didn't happen, as opposed to the 4-5 hours in the hot sun without any breeze. Time to start planning next weekend!