Coming to a crime scene near you!

The Sheriff has now played two benefits and has been out to jam a half dozen times.  So far, so good.  I can play about 70% of my material and I'm adding new material.  I will begin booking the band and playing for real.  I will call the next series of gigs "The Sheriff's Comeback Tour."

Something that surprised me during the mending process, is how many people identified with the injury and told me stories of their own injuries.  It was some combination of "Oh!  So you think YOUR injury was bad, listen to this..." and "don't worry, it will be okay because I came back from this..."  Here are some highlights (or maybe they're lowlights):

• A guitar player told me how he accidentally stuck his hand into a bucket of 400 degree tar, burning all the skin off his hand!  Sheesh!  I can't figure out how to do that accidentally! Can you?
• A drummer described how he shot a 4" nail through the knuckle of his hand and how the splint on his finger had him flipping the bird to everyone for months afterward.
• After hearing my story, a woman (not a musician) holds up her hand with the index finger missing.  I don't remember what kind of machine she tangled with to produce that result, but it's tough to whine about swelling after seeing that!

Every month beginning in December, I set myself a goal to get out and play before the end of the month. It was a huge milestone for me and I was eager to achieve it.

• December - not ready. Okay, maybe a little too optimistic. Let's go for January.
• January - not ready. Damn!
• February - not ready. Aw shit!
• March - still not ready. Oh man! How long is this going to take?

Finally, in late April I got out and played a jam at The Stonegate in Tacoma. I picked the songs in advance so I wouldn't play stuff that my hand wasn't ready to play. I was thinking I would minimize my profile and accept as a success any performance that didn't embarrass me. Thinking about it afterward, I realize that I had lost confidence in my ability and feared I might tarnish my reputation.

I went to The Stonegate jam thinking there would not be anyone there who knows me. I wanted to keep a low profile because I was afraid it would be a poor performance.

I'm eating pizza while wearing a glove on my left hand to keep it warm - waiting for the house band to arrive. When they arrived, I was surprised to find that things had changed and that the band leader for the jam is now Rafael Tranquilino, stalwart of the Randy Oxford Band and someone I have jammed with many times. He was very happy to see me. I told Rafael my sad story about the log splitter, blah, blah, blah...

So Rafael brings me up right away to play with him and his house rhythm section. I mentally prepared myself to be conservative and try not to play too strongly so as to minimize swelling of the finger. I counted in my first tune in 9 months and it started off pretty well. Then Rafael got excited and was throwing down hot guitar licks. I responded with same. Then I was trading fours with him. We were egging each other on. Each of the next two songs we upped the ante. Oh yeah, and I was playing conservatively... NOT! The only think I did that was conservative is to limit myself to the three songs I had planned! Nice demonstration of self control, Sheriff!

The great news was that I played three songs in public, did well, and had no setback from the experience. It gave me back a lot of the confidence that I had lost. It was my first victory on a long road back.

read next installment of Log Splitter Blues

After the emergency room, the stitches, wrapping and sterilizing twice or thrice daily, and removal of stitches, I now have to nurse a very swollen finger back to what I hope to be acceptable blues-playin' condition.

With the swelling, I have about 33% of my range of motion in two joints. All I know how to do is "work the finger" meaning rub it, flex it, and try to bend it. When I use my right hand to flex it, I feel the hydraulic pressure of the swelling against my skin preventing me from flexing very far. All I get from it is exploration of my tolerance for pain. After more than a month, I see no progress and seek professional help - physical therapy.

Twice-a-week physical therapy. My good fortune is to find that my therapist is a sympathetic soul - a blues singer. No kidding! A blues singer. We talked about Delbert McClinton and BB King. Cool.

With therapy, I learn many techniques for applying heat to the injured finger. I learn to wrap it in ways that expel some of the fluid from the swollen areas. Of course, I have to do it again and again because the swelling always returns. This is called "swelling management."

The therapist is very optimistic about my recovery. I'm sure that's part of her job. I roll back and forth between totally depending upon her optimism for my own mental health and thinking she's a lying bitch. She says I'll be back out playing in public sometime in December, probably. That would be a great Christmas present!

Around the 1st of November, I decide it's time to pick up a guitar and apply some reality to this situation. I tentatively lay my fingers on the strings and YE-O-O-O-O-WEEEE! Fucking-Holy-Jesus-Shit!!!! My guitar strings feel like razor blades! Oh God! Oh God!

"Okay, calm down dude. It's only pain. You have to work through the pain. Get yourself a bullet to bite, and try it again. See how long you can handle it. Okay. Okay..." Well, you get the picture. First day I worked all the way up to about five seconds. Back to "swelling management."

I'm a desperate man. Having no alternative, I doggedly continue the twice weekly PT until the insurance coverage runs out. I dream of being able to play in December.

Now I am on my own. No more PT. I apply everything I learned in PT - several times a day. Cold winter weather does not help. Heat is very important. I wear a glove indoors, even at the dinner table. I wear a glove to bed. Sheesh! At social occasions, I tell people I'm honoring Michael Jackson. Once in awhile I grab my crotch.

As December approaches I can tell playing out is not going to happen in December. In two months of PT, the finger begins to look like a finger again and bears a resemblance to my right index finger, except for the reddish color and the limited range of motion. I can now dependably play guitar for fifteen seconds every day. I reset my goal to January.

read next installment of Log Splitter Blues

The Sheriff is always workin' on new material. He will go to extremes to come up with a new blues tune. See if you can top this one.

Out here on the ranch (I really DO own a ranch), we burn about four cords of wood every winter. We buck up windfall trees and split'em for firewood. Sounds cool, but it's a lot of work. It's so much work that it interferes with all the other work that has to be done out here.

Enter the 26-ton log splitter.

So there I am single-handely splitting up my four cords of firewood using the 26-ton log splitter. I feel pressure on my left index finger. The pressure rapidly increases, and I realize that I am crushing my own freakin' finger in the log splitter. Shit!

I reversed the motion of the log splitter to free myself. When I pulled my bloody hand from my glove, there were five fingers still attached, but the index finger was like twice as wide as any of the others. It looked like a stomped-on cherry tomato.

Lemme tell ya, I invented a whole lot of new swear words, and none of 'em did anything to stop the pain. To hell with the pain! All that profanity was directed at ME for being such a stupid fool!

Mrs. Sheriff hauled my sorry ass off to the emergency room, where they stitched me up and send my bloody ass to the drug store for meds and first aid supplies.

All I can say is that I'd better get a blues song out of this or I'll be really pissed.

read next installment of Log Splitter Blues

There are many great blues songs about women. Wild women. Big-legged women. Hard-headed women. Whiskey-drinkin' women. Mean women. Pretty Women. Jealous women. Cheatin' women. Young women ("She's sixteen years old...") You know what I mean.

I never found one that saluted the character and spirit of a strong, loving woman of commitment. Maybe the subject isn't as dramatic as a pretty, young, big-legged, drinkin', cheatin', mean-spirited babe.

Well, I have to tell you that I have had the privilege in my life to know a number of women who are can be counted on to be there when the goin' gets tough... and the goin' always gets tough.

This song is about one of them.

I am frequently asked "Are you a REAL sheriff?"

Well of course, I'm a real sheriff. I am the Sheriff of Blues County so EVERYONE is in my jurisdiction!

The Sheriff is on patrol at all times. Be aware that in Blues County you can be cited for failing to disturb the peace or being on your best behavior.

Long ago in a place far away, I volunteered to produce the monthly newsletter of my local blues society. It was a tough job made tougher by a considerable amount of chaos near the publication date each month.

After the first couple months of chaos, I determined that we needed a monthly schedule with deadlines in order to reliably meet our publication date. Nothing revolutionary in that.

To my surprise, the Board was very concerned that we would not be able to enforce such deadlines. Without thinking too much about it, I threw off the flip remark "just tell'em there's a new sheriff in town."

Well, thereafter my "blues email" messages were addressed to "The Sheriff." It's kinda gotten out of control, hasn't it.

When The Sheriff was coming up, there were the Kings of the Blues. B.B. King, Albert King, and Freddy King. All truly Kings of the Blues.

Then there were the Queens, Crown Princes, Dukes, and Counts. What's a white boy with a guitar to do? It looks like we're down to mere constables.

Thus was born The Blues Sheriff.

As you know, B.B. King named his guitar Lucille. Albert named his Lucy. Clapton had Blackie. There are any others who did the same.

The Sheriff had to come up with something different. Well, how 'bout naming two guitars? Name two guitars! Alright! Yeah, that's the ticket!

So I call 'em "blues angels." Well, that's what I call 'em in public. In private, I call 'em "blues sluts" - just like me. They dig it!

Here are some nude photos of Pretty Woman and Caledonia:

Pretty Woman	Caledonia

Back when The Sheriff was still a trainee at the Sheriff's Acadmy, he wanted be be a rock musician. It was the sixties and there was stuff GOING ON! Who didn't want to play rock music, right?

Then one day, his roomie came home and said "Hey Sheriff, you've GOT to hear this!"
It was a live B.B. King album...

GAME OVER!

On the road to rock, a bluesman is born.