On the cusp of the first Firefly Funnel Cake Fandango, I thought I’d introduce everyone to Dad (@chilliefalls on Twitter) via video and ask the question everyone seems to want to know: A funnel cake trailer? WTF?
Firefly Funnel Cake Fandango – Why the heck a funnel cake trailer? from Jason Falls on Vimeo.
For more on Firefly Vodka, visit their cool-ass website and follow them on Twitter.
Some last minute technical difficulties moved our first stop to Wheel in Nashville, but Big Red made it. We’ll be rocking the #fandango from 6:30 p.m. until 8:30 p.m. tonight and can’t wait to see everyone in Nashvegas!
Here’s my first report from the road, which features a surprise appearance by Firefly Vodka. (Purely coincidental. I swear.):
Firefly Funnel Cake Fandango Day 1 – Arrival at the Wheel from Jason Falls on Vimeo.
Special thanks to Wheel and Robert Lee for the last minute accommodations. And a BIG thank you to Beth from Broad Band – an all female country group playing next door who let me move her truck to fit Big Red in out front. And to the construction crew two doors down that let us have the other half parking place we needed. See y’all on Music Row tonight!
For more on Firefly Vodka, visit their cool-ass website and follow them on Twitter.
Hey Funnel Cake nutters. It’s Chillie’s son, Jason. Dad gave you a little peek behind the curtain last week, but I wanted to let you know that you’re in for a regular roller coaster ride here on BigRedFunnelCakes.com this week. We’re going to be using Dad’s blog to share videos, blog posts and more on our big road trip.
Buckle up. This is gonna be fun.
Big Red - Coming To See You!
About a year ago, I showed Dad Twitter. When he started chatting with all the freaks and geeks in Internetland, he said, “I’d love to go to one of these conferences and meet all these folks.” So here we go.
Big Red, Dad and I are road trippin’ it to Austin, Texas, to bring Firefly Funnel Cake Fandango to South by Southwest, one of the largest Interactive, film and music conferences in the world. But we’re stopping along the way to make sure as many people as possible get some of that Funnel Cake Fandango magic.
Each night this week, starting tomorrow, Dad will pull Big Red up to an exclusive location and serve funnel cakes to anyone willing to buy. Firefly Vodka thought the trip was a cool idea and is sponsoring our shenanigans, too. Drink specials will be had, my friends. (Not to mention, Dad’s been working on a special Firefly Vodka funnel cake glaze. So much for my diet, right?)
We’re stopping at three exclusive locations en route and we want you to join us for a Firefly Funnel Cake Fandango FEEDUP:
Tuesday, March 9
Nashville, Tennessee – Corner Pub, 2000 Broadway
Wednesday, March 10
Little Rock, Arkansas – Big Whiskeys – 225 E. Markham Street
Thursday, March 11
Dallas, Texas – Black Finn’s – 4440 Beltline Road – Addison
The trip culminates with our opening night in Austin, Friday, March 12, for the official Firefly Funnel Cake Fandango at Molotov on West Sixth. Check out the RSVP page on Eventbrite. Social Media Explorer (my company) and Blue Clover Studios join forces with Firefly Vodka to put on a regular hootenanny. Come see some killer augmented reality, taste test (or just taste … or test) Firefly Vodka, get one of Dad’s famous funnel cakes (special ones have the Firefly glaze) and hang with some cool cats.
Austin is nuts and parties abound on Friday night. But it doesn’t take much to swing by for a funnel cake! We’ll be there from 8:30 until 1 … or so.
Nashville … Little Rock … Dallas … Austin … We can’t wait to hang with ya. Come see Dad, me, get a funnel cake and try some Firefly. Oh … and drink responsibly. See you soon.
Most of the details of the Funnel Cake Fandango have been released and Big Red is getting ready for a major road trip.
I’ll leave here on Monday and go to Nashville for our first event Tuesday at the Corner Pub Midtown, 2000 Broadway. There Big Red will offer our new Firefly Peach Tea Glaze for the funnel cakes. We will also have regular funnel cakes and fresh squeezed lemonade.
After the first event, we move on to Little Rock. The location will be announced later.
Thursday, the 11th, Big Red will be at Black Finn’s, 4440 Beltline Rd, Dallas and afterward move on to Austin.
Friday, the 12th, is our biggest event of the Fandango at Molotov, 719 W 6th St, Austin. The Friday night party should be huge with SXSW’s and should see lots of heavy hitters from the Social Media world plus Molotov’s owner, Brad Womack of ABC’s The Bachelor.
If you’re going to South by Southwest and can join us, please RSVP for the fun.
Other appearences in Austin will be announced later with days, times and locations.
Please keep checking back to this blog for on going news and updates from the road.
On a more personal note, I spent a couple of days at Peggy’s to see she and Kagen before I hit the road. Two things happened. One, while Peggy was giving me a much need haircut, Kagen pulled out the broom and dust pan and as soon as a lock of hair hit the floor, he swept it up and put it in the trash can. Ain’t child labor grand?
Then he got in trouble. He walked up to Peggy and patted her behind, saying to me, “That’s Grandma’s big butt.” I’m not sure it Peggy was more mad at Kagen for saying that, or at me for rolling in the floor laughing.
Stay tuned. Lots more to come.
Peggy’s daughter, Allison, recently lost Remy, her longtime companion, a beautiful yellow and white long haired cat that unfortunately spent the last couple of years of his life on only three legs. We all shared in her pain at losing a family member almost as much as if he were ours. Trust me, tears were shed by most of us.
It also helped me realize that my life is basically ruled by two cats. It used to be three, but I, too, lost one not too long ago.
I had always been a dog guy. One of my earliest recollections was playing with Rusty, our old cocker spaniel in front of the fireplace. I was 3 or 4 years old. After that, we always had a dog as I was growing up and I’ve had several during my adult years.
That changed in 1994 when my mother gave me a seal point Siamese for my birthday. Since I am a fan and avid reader of Lillian Jackson Braun’s ‘The Cat Who. . .’ books, I named her Koko after the chief investigator cat of Braun’s literary masterpieces. Actually, her personality is more like YumYum, the dainty female in the books, but mine became Koko.
Shortly after that, at my old warehouse downtown, a stray grey and white street cat walked in one day and said, “I’m here. Where’s dinner?” I named her Squirt and she promptly had two liters of kittens under my desk. Peggy took one kitten from each of the liters. Later, the first of those, had a liter and I adopted one of hers. So really, Brat is the grandson of Squirt. Keeping it in the family, I guess.
After I closed the warehouse, I moved Squirt out to the farm where she joined Brat and Koko. But Squirt always was my companion, slept with me and stayed on my desk if I was working. If I was watching TV, she was on my lap.
I still miss her unending loyalty and devotion.
As she’s gotten to be an old lady, Koko has more or less become my sister’s cat. Basically, she doesn’t like my cigarette smoke. But she is still mouthy and let’s you know exactly what she wants. While she loves to be a lap cat, a little rub of her ears gets her motor going and she has a purr that will rattle the windows.
Brat has grown up to be a mountain lion or about the same size. He strectches out to about 4′ and weighs better than 20 lbs. without an ounce of fat. But, he has no meow-er. He squeeks. But, for a squeeker, he has a pretty good vocabulary. While he sleeps with me some, he prefers stealing one of the dog’s beds. An avid bird watcher, he is usually found on the kitchen cabinets dreaming of an escape and chasing birds and squirrels. Hourly, he comes into the cave just to check on what I’m doing. Usually, he shows his disgust and stalks off. And I can’t go to the bathroom or take a shower without his supervision. Freaks me out a bit.
Ironically, Brat tries to be the dominant male, but Koko kicks his butt all of the time. He is usually nursing a scratch, bite mark or missing fur from the dainty little Siamese.
By the way, why do cats prefer bathroom water to kitchen water? I have to keep a drip going because they can’t lower themselves to drink out of the water bowls the other animals use.
Both Koko and Brat have their own food and their own eating place. Although Brat likes to steal some of Koko’s food, much to her consternation.
It’s even worse at Peggy’s. She has four.
We finally had a decent game at Liberty last week, followed by two more that were terrible. I have one more game that I’m doing on Friday night and then I have to cancel out the last Women’s game as I’ll be on my way to Texas.
It looks like the Firefly Funnel Cake Fandango will be making an appearance in Nashville and one in Dallas before heading to Austin. We’re working on a Firefly glaze for the funnel cakes to honor our title sponsor, Firefly Vodka. And SXSW should be a ball. I think Jason is going to make some changes to these pages and we will probably be driving pictures, videos and content from the trip to this blog. So starting next week, keep checking back. You can keep up with us daily here as well as on Twitter and Facebook.
I’ll keep you posted.
This is Getting Old
I’m sitting at my desk watching it snow again. That seems like the only thing I’ve done forever. That’s not entirely true, it just appears that way.
We’ve had three major snow events this winter already dumping more snow than we’ve seen in the past three or four years combined. And more to come.
It has been even worse at Peggy’s in Harrisonburg. They are up to something like 7 feet this winter plus their temperatures have run as much as 20 degrees colder than the farm and it is only about 100 miles away. Yesterday, it was 10 below there, and a toasty 6 degrees here.
Kagen Shoveling Snow
Following in his “Oompah’s” entrepreneurial spirit, Kagen has started his own snow removal business. He’ll come shovel your snow for the low price of some mac and cheese and an oreo cookie.
Big Red is starting the year behind last year’s pace. While the basketball games at Liberty have kept me busy, they have been terrible and I’m basically just covering my labor. Couple that with the loss of three shows at the Richmond Raceway due to downsizing, we’re running behind and I may need to float a loan from Kagen, whose business is thriving.
Tank and Laura, the future Mrs. Tank, have been working the games with me. I’ll say one thing. Tank found him a winner. Laura has been a great addition to the Big Red team (except when she’s teaching school).
"I've Got To Have Some Quiet to Read"
Contrary to what my liberal friends would say, all of this snow isn’t a result of global warming, the polar icecap, La Nina or atmospheric radiation. It’s just a cyclical weather thing. This winter is like the ones when I was a kid. Of course that was a long time ago when Grover Cleveland was President and Georgia was a prison colony. When the jet stream makes up its mind and goes back the way it has the past few years, Chicago again will once again get all of this snow that’s been hammering Virginia.
This weekend, we’ll be in Richmond for the RV Show at the Raceway. Tank, Kaitlyn and Adam will all be on hand for that. It’s another of those full menu shows. And, I’m strongly thinking of introducing Fried Hot Dogs for the first time. They are awesome.
LU Crews Have Done Great Job Getting Vines Ready for Games
The Firefly Funnel Cake Fandango is taking shape for next month. It looks like I’ll be meeting up with Jason in Louisville on the 8th and striking out for Austin, TX. We’ll probably have three or four stops along the way, and then spend five or six days at the SXSW Interactive Conference. Big Red will be set up at a couple locations in Austin, but one is at The Molotov owned by Brad Womack of ABC’s The Bachelor. There we’ll host a party of 500 of the Fandango’s friends at SXSW. Not only will I be slamming out the funnel cakes like crazy, but I’m sure there will be lots of Lemonade for the Firefly.
After we leave Austin, we will have several more stops on our way back to Louisville. I leave there and get back home as quickly as I can to get ready for our first race of the year at Martinsville.
I’m sure you’ll be getting lots of updates on the Fandango via Twitter, Facebook and our blogs. And probably lots of pictures too. While I’m in Texas, I hope our new governor can get Virginia moved back from its current location outside of Ottawa.
Inside Booth at the Fishing Expo
2010 really got its start this past weekend with the Fishing Expo at Richmond Raceway. This is our third year doing this show and the first where we had decent weather. At least on Friday and Saturday. Sunday was rainy and nasty but at least it wasn’t brutely cold like the past two years.
We all got to welcome a new member to the Big Red family as Adam Brewer, Kaitlyn’s boyfriend, worked on Friday and Saturday. Tyler, one of their friends who had worked for us at one of the Richmond races, helped on Sunday. Kaitlyn ran our booth inside, Tank and I cooked on Big Red outside.
While it wasn’t the best show we’ve done, it wasn’t bad. A nice solid effort. Our ribeye sales were down from last year and that caused us not to have a great show. But still it is the kind of show I’d like to do every week.
Tank Cooking Steaks Inside Big Red
Plus, I love the staff and promoters. Les and his guys are great to work with.
You can check them out at ncboatshows.com.
With the economy as it is, many of the shows are downsizing. That has caused us to lose a couple of shows we had scheduled in the next month or so which has caused me to do some mad scrambling trying to replace them on my calendar. Couple that with the lousy sales at our basketball games lessons the success of the year’s start.
One the plus side of the equation, we are definitely adding three tracks to our racing schedule for 2010. We will be in Michigan twice, Watkins Glen twice and Kansas once. Because of that, I have to add some more equipment so my research is on going looking for the best deal I can find for some major purchases.
I still don’t have the final word on the national tour but hope that will fall in place shortly as I have a lot of work to do if we’re going to pull it off.
All in all, I’m very excited about the New Year and can’t wait for March to get here when everything starts rolling big time.
Huge Lines at Winterfest
My sincere apologies to both my avid readers for not posting anything for the past month. There are many reasons why: extreme laziness, and not much happening in the Funnel Cake world are near the top of the list.
Another reason is my heartfelt position as one of the ultimate Bah Humbug guys in the world. I just don’t care for the holidays, all of the shopping in horrible crowds, decorations on everything. It’s an emotional drain and I’d like to move it all to July. Maybe I’d get more in the spirit of things then.
Actually, there are a couple of valid reasons beyond my being a curmudgeon. I get pulled from a bunch of directions needing to be at the farm, at Peggy’s, doing Christmas with mom at the nursing home. Goodness knows, I’d love to make a Kentucky trip to see Grant, Katie, Nancy and that other fat boy in the Falls clan during the holidays.
But, I end up running up and down the road just trying to keep everybody happy.
Kagen: A Rock Start in the Making
My other problem is caused by my horrible lack of financial planning. Because December is my worst month of the year, I never have enough money to do the holidays like I’d prefer. July would be a much better month for me and maybe with more money at my disposal, I could be more like my sister: a Christmas nut.
Basketball at Liberty has been horrible so far and I’m barely covering my expenses. Winterfest was OK but nothing like it was three years ago when we rocked.
Today, I put 2009 to bed. Well, except for tax time. And, it’s been a pretty good year.
During a year where the economy has been awful to say the least, my business was up by over 25%. Most of that was from the races at Richmond and Martinsville, and my very successful season with the Potomac Nationals. Football was down slightly due mainly to neither Liberty nor JMU making the playoffs and the additional games. The regular season games did well and some new records were set.
Big Red also ventured out of state for the first time doing shows in Maryland and Kentucky.
Balance that with the loss of my Walmart fund raisers and Belvedere Plantation the whole month of October due to them doing concessions themselves, I certainly can’t complain.
Brat the Cat: "What are You Fools Doing?"
2010 looks like another year of increases. While it’s not definite yet, we’re probably adding at least two new tracks for races. Big Red’s national tour is still in the final planning stages. At this point, all I know for sure is it will end in Austin, TX for the huge SXSW Conferences. Not sure where I’ll be going or what I’ll be doing before we get there, but that announcement should be forthcoming by mid-January. Our contract with the Nationals has been renewed for the year and we still have a bunch of dates for shows at Richmond Raceway. There are also proposals on the table for another region of Americrown (which could add even more races) and for several larger arenas. I hope to hear from them this week.
Perhaps the biggest change in all of this is losing Peggy. She’s been my right arm thru these past six years going back to the days of selling funnel cakes as a little parttime venture for my retirement so we could take a cruise every year. Her son Todd heads for basic training in the Army on January 11, and Peggy will take over fulltime care of Kagen while he’s gone.
Now that the holidays are over, I’m getting excited about my outlook for the year and there should be much news forthcoming.
To all of you, my best for the New Year.
Dukes Marching Band Enter for Final Game
Unfortunately, football season came to an end for Big Red last Saturday as JMU closed out its home season. Even though the Dukes won, they didn’t make the playoffs as was expected before the season started. Due to that, I had to hold three weekends open in case of home playoff games like last year. So, I’ve been scrambling for bookings.
Liberty’s season ended a couple of weeks ago without a playoff invitation either.
Lines for Funnel Cakes during Final Game
Both schools are undergoing stadium construction projects over the next three years increasing seating considerably. It’s very likely Big Red will need to expand to two locations at both in the future to keep up with demand from more fans. Needless to say, my planning for next fall has started already.
JMU’s last game was decent but not a record setter. Of course, attendance was down from the earlier sellouts since they weren’t in the playoff hunt. But, we were still pretty busy.
I let Chuck handle all of the cooking for the first time and he did a great job. My thinking is that when we go to two locations for a game, he needs to be ready to handle the high volume at one of the locations. He’s ready.
Peggy Sets Up Booth Inside Vines Center
Basketball season started at Liberty which features a little bit different set up. I have to cook outside in Big Red and use runners to our booth inside. So far, the games haven’t gone all that well although we had a fair game for the ESPN televised game against Clemson which was nearly a sell out for the Vines Center.
This week there are four games at Vines so I’ll be busy all week, Shortly after that, the kids go home for Christmas which will give us almost a month with no games. Our only big event coming up is Winterfest at Liberty over New Years eve and New Year Day. We’ve done really well there in the past.
Big Red Outside Vines Center
This weekend, I put in a couple of days at Royal in Harrisonburg but it was a waste of time. Despite every effort I could make trying to draw folks in using both Twitter and Facebook, I did little more than break even.
Oh, well. Can’t win them all.
Mixing Stuff
Hi. My name is Kagen Conner and I’m 2 1/2 years old. My ‘Oompa” is the fat guy that cooks funnel cakes for everybody and my grandma is Peggy that works for him most of the time.
This year was my third Thanksgiving but I don’t remember much about the first two because I was so little. Since I’m now a big boy, my grandma lets me help in the kitchen and this year, I got to fix a pecan pie.
First, you had to put a bunch of stuff in a pan and stir it up with this whirley-gig thingy. I think it’s called an egg beater but I just use a fork when I make my scrambled eggs. Then, when you get all that stuff mixed up, you have to start on the pie crust. I like that part best.
Making Dough
You measure out the flour and put it in the big mixer with butter and some other stuff my grandma added. Then you turn on the mixer and watch go round and round.
Then you take the dough and plop it on the counter, sprinkle some more flour on it and roll it with the rolling pin. My grandma said something about using the rolling pin on my “Oompa” but I didn’t understand what she meant.
Rolling the Dough
After you get the dough really thin, you put it in the pie pan without sticking your fingers thru it. Then pour all of the other junk from the pan in the pie and throw some pecans on top.
Then it goes in the oven but you have to be really careful ’cause its really hot.
After an hour or so, the pie comes out and sits on the dining room table to cool. But you can’t eat it until after you eat all that turkey and stuff the next day.
Kagen's Pie in Oven
I did find out that you can’t run your cars in the leftover dough. They get all yucky and I had to sneak them in the dishwasher so the wheels would turn again.
My pecan pie was really good even though Grandma forgot to get the white stuff that goes on top.
After we finished, I had to take a good bath because I had flour in my hair and behind my ears. And, Grandma had to run the vacuum to get the flour off the floors. I don’t know how that could have happened.
Flour Everywhere
On Thanksgiving Day, my “Oompa” fried the turkey outside and I got to watch only he kept yelling at me to stay back. Grandma made a bunch of other stuff in the house too.
Then all of these people started coming, we had to put the cats in the basement, and before long the house was full. I think they are all relatives of mine, only I don’t really know what that means. Then we got to eat.
Turkey Cooking Merrily Away
I missed my Auntie Allie this year because she had to go somewhere with her boyfriend and his family. I don’t understand that boyfriend business but my daddy says I will soon enough. I did get to wear a new outfit Auntie Allie got me and “Oompa’ said I looked like a jock. I don’t really know what that means either.
I guess I have a lot to learn about Thanksgiving, huh?
