2 Hours, 18 Minutes

That's how long it took me to get from the studio to home this afternoon. Unfreakin' believable. My ship has been sunk.

The insanity of my life means I did not get to do a couple of things I wanted to do today. One was go to Porter's funeral service. Kyle Cantell went, so XM was definitely represented. Tomorrow I plan to go up and pay my respects at his plaque in the Hall of Fame.

Last Tuesday they were re-airing the Bill Anderson show with Porter on XMX, and in between they ran excerpts from Porter's interview with Bob Edwards, of XM Public Radio. I'd forgotten, until I heard it, that I'd run the board for that session from Nashville. And I was reminded re-listening to it how sharp he was, even at his age, with dates and memories.

Another thing I did not get to do was the Americana Honors and Awards. I had a ticket to the show, and am credentialed for the Conference. But I haven't made it over there yet. Tomorrow.

On the bright spot though, I had a surprise visit in the studio today from Jerrod Niemann. Y'all know how completely brain dead I am lately, I'm sure he thought I was a complete idiot. I literally sat there for a few minutes while we were chatting about stuff thinking "I know I had something I wanted to tell him... Jerrod... Jerrod... Garth... Jerrod..." I went through the whole "More than a Memory, no that wasn't his song, what did I want to say..." And we're chatting about KC, and he listened to me whine about being buried in Garth lately... and finally as he was getting ready to leave, it hit me.

He co-wrote my favorite new Garth tune! So I got to tell him, as I've told all of you a zillion times now, how I love "Midnight Sun." He told me some very cool stuff about the writing of that song, and told me all about the video! He and Richie and Chuck and Rodeo were all in the video shoot, and it sounds like a blast. I can't wait to see it! I won't spoil the surprise for you, but just be thinking "cowboys... quantam leap."

The stuff he told me about writing the song was nothing I'd heard Garth talk about yet... we're definitely going to have to have Jerrod into the studio and on the record to share some of these awesome stories!

Which leads me to the next confession. He brought us a copy of the new album, which I put in and listened to a little later in the afternoon. Really, it's a shame the boy isn't a little more country.... ha! No, seriously, you know how I love the hard core honky tonk stuff... this album is full of it.

So again... after everything I've been working on the past couple of weeks... Brain.Completely.Fried. And I'm listening, and we get to "Whiskey Kind of Way" and I'm singing along... I think about it being a Zona Jones song (which is how I first heard it)... and then I'm like... wait a minute... didn't this album come out already?

I was totally stumped... I was sure not only that the CD had come out, but that we'd had him in for an episode of Driver's Ed. Which we normally don't play until Street Week. And I started Googling, and couldn't for the life of me figure out if the album had come out. But I knew some of these songs. But the track listing didn't match up to the music listed somewhere on the internet. Amazon.com didn't have the album listed at all. My brain exploded.

So, I picked up the phone - Jay Thomas to the rescue. Jerrod has not (yet!) done Driver's Ed... because his album hasn't come out yet... They're getting ready to release the 2nd single...he did come see us in Vegas... and I probably had an advance copy of the album before, possibly with a slightly different track listing.

As soon as I find out when the album is coming out, I'll let you know.

Before I let you go, I have to just tell you how ridiculously horrible Garth's interview on Fox and Friends was this morning. Yuck. Whoever wrote that anchor's script should be fired. They were all over the place, and didn't seem to know what the heck they were talking about.