It was a great weekend to live in Jessamine County. We had our Taste of Jessamine event on Friday, and the Wine and Vine Festival at the week’s end. Round that all out with Mother’s Day, and you have a winning weekend—with gorgeous weather to boot.

At a meeting I attended on Monday, I was privy to a conversation about one of the events of the Wine and Vine Festival last week, and how the best part was that so many people in attendance were local. That’s good for the city to have residents feeling that way. I hope many people do, as that local support is a key ingredient in making such community events live, breathe and grow.

Nicholasville is in a very unique situation as a community due to its geographic locale. There is a very tangible smaller-town charisma that the community possesses, yet like other towns that lay on the outskirts of growing metropolitan areas such as our neighbor to the north, Nicholasville has found itself in an ongoing growth spurt that is moving faster than the culture can keep up with. That may be a negative to the “grass is greener elsewhere” folks, but I dare say that to most Jessamine Countians, it is a positive that they cling to with pride more than romanticism.

Myself, I’m not really into wine that much, but I do like watching some good mud racing. So after checking out the festivities downtown, Sarah and I really had a good time watching the Mud Run Saturday night. What makes a night of mud racing even better? Getting ready to watch while eating a grilled hamburger and listening to The Moron Brothers perform “Dueling Banjos” and “Nine Pound Hammer.” Now THAT is a Saturday night—all right here in Nicholasville!

At the end of the day, it comes down to one simple fact: community is the key. If we support our community with our entertainment and shopping dollars, our community will support us with good times, good wines, good mud and good fun!

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Not all of my weekend adventures took place in Nicholasville, however. On Sunday, I did what I am sure most of you reading did: I mowed my lawn again. After doing that, I went into Richmond and spent the afternoon with my mother. Now, I love my mother and try to visit her regularly—and not just to eat, which you would presume by looking at me. A bonus to stopping by her house is getting to visit her dog, Bougie (pronounced “boogie”), who is a goofy-looking little mop with four legs and no handle. You only learn that he has eyeballs when he jumps and his hair flops up. 

Despite his small stature, Bougie has a deep voice, and so much of one that he will crack you up when his vocal cords let forth their ferocity while he’s looking up at you from his eight-inches-from-the-floor vantage point. The real fun begins when I walk up to him, look down at him, start slapping my leg for percussive rhythm, and begin singing that horribly awful 1975 anthem from KC and the Sunshine Band, “Boogie Shoes”. That has become my nickname for the poor little guy and he knows it. Singing one chorus to him is usually all it takes to get his tail wagging and the barking going. By the time I hit the second chorus, his barking has so much oomph to it that it brings his front legs a good three inches up off the ground with each woof.

As you can probably imagine, it only takes a few minutes before Bougie gets ushered off to his bedroom kennel to return the household to peace and quiet. I receive an icy glare for my role in the ruckus, but my conscience tells me that it should be the other way around. A stint in solitary confinement is the minimum sentence that should be doled out to myself and any other guilty parties for singing “Boogie Shoes” in public. 

But alas, I remain a free man, Bougie has forgiven me for letting him take the rap yet again and we had a happy Mother’s Day this year. I hope you all did as well!