Salutations, one and all!  Yes, it is very early to be awake and writing.  Ah-- you are saying to yourself  "But it's nine in the morning; she slept in... what is she talking about?"  But I didn't go to bed and fall asleep until 4 AM.  Stay tuned to find out why!

Before I go into my story of late and later night frivolity and hijinx ("jinx" being the key word here, lol!), I want to say thank you, thank you, thank you! to our wonderful features from last night's show:

                        Leah Collova,  talented songwriter, singer, guitarist,

                           Miles Budimir, acclaimed Cleveland poet,

 and

                            John Dorsey, Toledo poet extraordinaire

They were (and are, of course!) totally sublime, beyond wonderful, and supercalifragilistiexpialidocious (yes, I double-checked the spelling)!!!  And I am happy to report that Leah will be following up last night's second-ever feature gig with a New Year's Eve show at the 806!  (For details, you can reach Leah at her myspace page, www.myspace.com/leahlou12)

Of course, even with all the talent, skill, and raw power that our features displayed last night, we needed an audience to participate and make it all come together... and we had one HELL of an audience!  (Hey, I'm allowed to say "hell"... it was the Church of Poetry, with Jesus Crisis as co-host--haha!):

And here's where I want to thank our utterly fantastic audience and friends who were there last night... without you, we couldn't have had a show!  Whether you were there as a listener and supporter, enjoying the fine poetry and music, or there participating as an open mic-er and adding to the show itself, you were appreciated, adored, and awesome!  So, muchas gracias, muchachos y muchachas!

(Couldn't get the entire audience in this shot -- I did take several shots, so please go to the photo albums to see the full run of photos; you're probably there!) 

And we must do a huge and heartfelt shout-out to our very good friend Chris Draime, also known as VXX of the Poet's Haven, who provided us with all the sound equipment we needed to do the show... plus, he set it all up for us, too.  He's our own personal Santa Claus...

                                                      Thank you, VX!

Why did I say "jinx" and 4 AM earlier in this blog?  Because we were "sleighed" by circumstance (hey, I've been hanging with Jesus Crisis-- if you'll forgive the expression-- and his punning has been rubbing off on me).  The "circumstance"was a double-booking for the lounge where we were to do our show at 7pm... a party had our spot.  So we were forced-- at literally the last minute-- to tell all our arrivals that we had to hang out for an hour and wait for the party to clear out.  John and I both felt very badly that this happened, but I swear!  We were both there early-- before 6:30-- to ensure that everything would start on time and go smoothly.  We did have it all planned out!  There was no choice in the matter, however, and because we are gifted with such good friends, everyone stayed, drank, mingled, and supported and encouraged us.  And the night was a success!!!

I've deliberately kept this blog general and brief-- please go to the Crisis Chronicles site for a more detailed blog with many more fantastic photos, written by the master-blogger himself, John "Jesus Crisis" Burroughs.  I'm sure he'll be posting it soon, so keep an eye out for it-- aw, go on, keep both of them peeled, lol!

                                 
Thus endeth the Lix and Kix Poetry Extravaganzas for the year of 2008...  we'll be back, better than ever, in the New Year, with many many more great poets and musicians.  We'll gather, mingle, expound, recite, perform, listen, enjoy, enthuse, entertain, and rock the house!  And the best part of it all?  We get to hang with you, our good friends!

Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, Cool Yule, Good Tidings, and Hugs to All...!