And Then It Was Goodbye

Incase you missed it, I've moved. I don't want any of the regular readers to email me and say "where'd you go?" I've expressed my sentiments in a little poem. Ok, part of it is stolen. We used to write this on crap in elementary school.

Sista was here, but, now she's gone
She left her name to carry on
Blogger's been sometimes good and sometimes bad
So, she's moving it on over to try TypePad

Y'all didn't know I was a poet, did you? Another side of me I haven't shown lately. A little rusty, perhaps. Maybe I'll dust off the rhyming side at my new place. Change it in your favorites and do come see me.

Blogger Can Kiss My....

I'm going to see if the grass really IS greener. I'm going to go to the other side of the fence for a bit and see if I like better over there. If I don't, then I'll reluctantly move back to the Big B.

www.sistasmiff.typepad.com

Moving On Up?

Because I'm fed up with Blogger, we might move the Whiff to a new home. Stay tuned.

We May Never Be The Same

The Teen Daughter is now the proud owner of a Pink Razr phone.

I got to looking at that thing and said "Dang...I want one of these."

Blogger Issews

Obviously, something is amiss with my blog template. Being my technical abilities are limited, I have no idea what the problem is. Until I can figure it out, I'll have to go generic. I really dig my flowers, so, hopefully we can figure this thing out.

One more picture from the IBMA Awards Thursday night...this one is courtesy Producer J. In the midst of all the chaos after the Big Win, when Mr. Smiff and them finally got around to coming to the back where we were, it was REALLY chaotic. I happened to look down and there is #2 running around with his dad's trophy...which is made out of glass. I could just see it falling to the floor in a million pieces.

Luckily, it made it home in one piece.

If You Like Your Flicks Southern Fried..

If you want a peek inside the real kitchen of Hazel Smith, don't forget to tune into CMT tonight at 7:00 central time. She will be hosting a screening of "Hooper" for your viewing pleasure and making some tasty dish in between scenese. I want to say she made Chicken and Dressing for this one, but, am not 100% sure.

Uncle Josh

Word began to filter out mid morning around the Nashville Convention Center were the IBMA festivities were still in full swing that dobro legend Burkett "Uncle Josh" Graves had passed away after many years of failing health.

Josh went to work with Flatt and Scruggs in 1955. The Tellico Plains, TN native adopted a style of dobro playing that paralelled Earl Scruggs three finger banjo style. In doing so, Joshwas the first person to use the dobro in bluegrass and he influenced just about anybody you see playing dobro today, including people like Jerry Douglas, Phil Ledbetter, Mike Auldridge, and Rob Ickes.

There's a way bluegrass people say the name "Uncle Josh" that evokes nothing but pure respect and admiration. Besides being the man credited for bringing the resonator guitar, or the dobro, into bluegrass music and into national prominence, Josh was loved and respected as a friend and more than that, a devoted family man.

In fact, one of my most vivid memories of Josh did not occur on a stage or at a picking party, but, at Centennial Hospital in Nashville in 1998. I had just given birth to #2 after a rather traumatic delivery. Mr. Smiff and I went for a walk down the hall to the nursery to look at #2 (he had some minor issues and they kept him in the nursery a lot to monitor him).

We're looking in the window and I looked up and thought I was seeing things. "Is that Josh?" I asked Mr. Smiff. Indeed it was. He had come down to the hospital to see his newest great-grandchild. Josh was not a large man in stature, but, he swelled up pretty big with pride pointing out his great-grandbaby.

Josh had had a number of health problems in recent years. In spite of a number of brushes with death, he was still working when he could and worked as recently as August at J. D. Crowe's festival in Kentucky.

Josh Graves will be missed by countless people around the world. I hope there will be tons of articles and tributes to this legendary man.