Tag: music

A fun summer night listening to the Barenaked Ladies at the Maine State Pier.

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I was intrigued by the Maine State Pier music venue. I loved the idea of hanging out on the waterfront while listening to music, so when they started announcing the musical acts that would be playing at this young venue over the summer, we quickly grabbed a couple of tickets to see the Barenaked Ladies “Last Summer on Earth 2016” tour.

As with most tickets, you buy them so far ahead of time, there’s often a disconnect between when you buy them and when you actually go to the show, but eventually the night arrived and we headed to Portland. Apparently, there’s also a disconnect on how long it takes to get the blog post up too since this show was back in June and I’m finally getting around to posting about it! Good news though, there are still more concerts scheduled at Maine State Pier with an especially busy block of shows the first few days of September. You can check out the full schedule HERE.

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A Hot Night at the Portland Lobster Company

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There are about three nights during the summer that are stifling hot. I don’t have air conditioning at my house which is by choice. While there are many warm summer days, I have an abundance of windows which usually provide a nice breeze and, along with a few fans, is enough to keep me relatively cool and happy. But, there are those few random days each summer when I feel like I’m going to melt. On a recent Friday, when after doing something as simple as washing the dishes I was sweating as if I had dug a six foot trench, I knew we’d hit one of those days. I was drenched and desperately looking for a way to cool off.

What to do on such a hot day? Head into Portland and grab dinner at one of their many outside venues, and hope for an encounter with a lovely ocean side breeze. We hadn’t been to the Portland Lobster Company yet this season, and a hot night seemed like the perfect time to enjoy this fun summer outside destination. It’s one of my favorites, but things have been hectic and the timing hadn’t worked before now.

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#atozchallenge | P is for Port City Music Hall and Bruce in the USA

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My husband and I tried something new this past Valentine’s Day. We went to Port City Music Hall in Portland to listen to a Bruce Springsteen tribute band: Bruce in the USA. We’ve both been huge fans of Bruce for a long time, and have been fortunate enough to have seen him on many of his tours, but we weren’t sure what to expect from a cover band and I was a little nervous. In my hesitation, I waited until the morning of Valentine’s day to actually buy our tickets which meant we paid more for them. This didn’t sit well with my coupon loving soul but what can you do? It was my own fault.

It was the first time we had ever been to Port City Music Hall and the venue was great. It’s a large open space and, other than a small VIP seating area off the left, it was a standing room, general admissions event. I’m not sure if all their shows are setup the same way or not. I’ve read online that for some of their events, such as a comedy show, they do put out seats. But for this rocking evening, it was VIP or standing room. We were standing.

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Bull Feeney's

St. Patrick’s Day Fun in Portland, Maine

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While we have always celebrated St. Patrick’s Day, it has been a long time since we celebrated with a night on the town. Our more recent St. Patrick’s Day celebrations have been focused more on a semi-traditional home cooked meal of corned beef and green mashed potatoes. (We don’t do cabbage in our house.) But, this year, we decided the time was right to head into Portland so that my husband could listen to Irish music and drink Guinness in the company of other happy St. Patrick’s Day participants.

My husband is only half-Irish, but he leans towards those genetics and absolutely loves Irish music. The St. Patrick’s Day activities offered so many great opportunities to catch live Irish music which was our deciding factor in heading out for the night.

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7 Differences between Austin, Texas and Portland, Maine

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I spent this past week down in Austin, Texas for a work conference. It was my first visit to the area and while the majority of my time was spent inside a hotel attending conference related events, there were a few things that I was able to enjoy in Austin, that would not have been possible if I had been back home in Maine.

Seven things I would not have been able to do in Maine:

1) Eat Outside. I enjoyed an al fresco lunch soaking in the sunshine. I was in Austin in early March, when things are still relatively chilly in Maine.While eating outside is something that I love to do during the summers in Maine, even with the unseasonably warm winter we’ve had this year, dining outside is not really an option in March. But, it did get me excited for the warmer weather heading our way.

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