I've been home with a cold all day, well, the past two days to be honest, but I am feeling a little better, finally. Hopefully I'll be back to work tomorrow, especially since I am pretty much out of time off. Now this cold has messed up my sleep schedule. Even though it's my normal bed time, I am wide awake. We've been having thunderstorms here all day long and it was really cool for awhile, but now we are approaching the point of flooding so I think it should slack up a bit. If it doesn't it should be an interesting ride to work in the morning. I have a new obsession. It's twitter.com. It's kinda hard to explain what it is, but as soon as you figure it out, it makes sense. Basically you have a box for no more than 140 characters that you answer the question 'What are you doing right now?' Other people can subscribe to your feed so everytime you answer the question, it shows up for them. Obviously, you can subscribe to other peoples feeds and when they enter something, it shows up for you. I started watching it after I heard Leo LaPorte talk about it on one of his podcasts and it seemed silly, then I tried it. It is so addictive it's unreal. I only have a few people I watch but it's still fun. If you want to find me just sign up at twitter.com, and search for Enlighten_Up, and there I am. I watched an interesting special on the history of Rock-a-billy that kinda depressed me tonight. Of course they covered the huge names in Rockabilly of which there are about 7. Elvis, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, Buddy Holly and Jerry Lee Lewis. They also covered a couple of lesser known guys but I just felt like they missed the heart and sole of it. You see, my home town, Helena, Arkansas, is just down the road from Memphis, TN and is famous for two things. Cotton, and Music. More of the history of the Blues came from right around Helena than you can imagine. Robert Johnson, Robert Lockwood, Johnny Shines, BB King, Frank Frost…the list goes on. The other kind of music the town is known for is Rockabilly. True, grass roots Rockabilly. There is a Rockabilly Hall Of Fame and their are quite a number of guys that I either new growing up, dated their daughters, hung out with their sons and even played in bands with their sons that are in there. At the time I was growing up, I didn't recognize them for what they were. But I sure do now. Take Skeet Seaton. I spent quite a bit of time at Skeet's place because my best friend was dating his step-daughter. I knew he played drums and I knew he was good, but at the time I didn't know how much he had meant to rockabilly. He lived catty-cornered from my friend John. I remember talking to Skeet about the blues when I was young and explaining about Eric Clapton. He introduced me to some stuff that didn't sink in at the time, but is like the preacher talking from the bible to me now. Now right around the corner from Skeet's place was the guy who used to play bass with me, Micah Evans. His dad was Jimmy 'Lefty' Evans. Jimmy played bass with EVERYBODY, wrote songs for them too. Ronnie Hawkins, Conway Twitty, Johnny Rivers, Jerry Lee Lewis, this list goes on. Jimmy was a gruff old guy, but loveable just the same. I remember that he and Micah shared the same bass. Micah and I would make some plans to play and his dad would have a gig, soooooo, no bass. Micah was furious. We used to sit in Micah's room analyzing the latest Iron Maiden bass line and his dad would be out in the living room jamming with Levon Helm and C. W. Gatlin. We had no idea at the time who these people were. We just wanted them to hurry up. But again, sitting and listening was one of the greatest learning experiences I ever had. I used to work with a band with a drummer named Tommy Ray Gatlin. Tommy was an animal on the drums. Literally. He could have been the prototype for the muppet. He either hit the drums hard or he hit the drums and heads broke. There was tons of power in his playing. His dad was C. W. Gatlin, who was Conway Twitty's guitarist . He has quite a rep in both country and Rockabilly There were others. Mack Self was from Helena and was HUGE. These guys were great….legends. They are in the Rockabilly Hall of Fame for a reason. Because they are great. I just wish they could have gotten a little mention on a show about the history of rockabilly. Just a little bit of what they truly deserve.