Gram Parsons was a musical pioneer, multi instrumentalist, and fellow Georgian. The creator of Cosmic American Music left a strong impression in his short career, and the music he made continues to inspire. I visited his grave in New Orleans some years ago (getting directions to his grave site from a lady assisting at a funeral, who saw him perform with the Flying Burrito Brothers - opening for the Grateful Dead at the Avalon Ballroom in San Francisco, no less - was an experience I'll never forget). It was decorated with shells and small keepsakes from fans, and this time I brought my own: a pale blue guitar pick I'd had since the late 80's when I was bassist in a garage band. Not sure where to place it, I went for the most natural choice, between the thumb and index finger on the marker. It fit perfectly.
Author, editor, blogger, and so much more Shaun Mullen has passed. Noting his blog Kiko's House hadn't been updated in a while, I did a search and discovered his obituary . My friendship with Shaun goes back to 2006. While living in Australia, I'd discovered his blog when searching for informed commentary on US foreign policy in the Middle East. Sadly, much of that policy remains unchanged 14 years later, but that is for another post. Shaun had noticed that his blog wasn't rendering correctly in Internet Explorer and asked if anyone could suggest a fix. I, being a bit of a tech head at the time, suggested Firefox or similar browser, and the problem was solved. We kept in and out of touch, finding common ground in music (I mentioned my love for the Grateful Dead and Shaun sent a dozen CDs of concert recordings. By International mail. The man was generous to a fault.), worldview, and more. My old site got its greatest number of hits when Shaun linked to a few of m
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