Music City muse

The Man writes...early this morning I got back from a hectic two day visit to Nashville, Tennessee.

Here are some more images from the conference hotel. With nearly three thousand rooms, it is the twenty-ninth biggest hotel in the world. Its distinctive feature is three huge atriums - the "Delta" atrium alone covers 4.5 acres and is 150 feet tall - containing fake rivers, fake waterfalls, fake landscape, real plants, real buildings, and various expensive restaurants and shopping opportunities. There were hundreds of guests, usually a couple of weddings in progress, many families with kids, and a few harried and lost looking conference delegates.

Of course the atriums were air conditioned to provide us all with a perfect never-changing climate. Perhaps it was meant as a glimpse of a future where we all spend our our lives indoors, shielded from a poisoned uninhabitable Earth. I found it ludicrous and annoying.

Downtown Nashville is relatively humble. One street - Lower Broadway - is lined almost exclusively with numerous small, smokey bars. Many had long lines outside, each had a basic stage up front and a small band playing Country music for tips.