Jammed with a band for the first time tonight: on blues harp

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I jammed with a band tonight for the first time ever. I play blues harp. The people were very warm and friendly and supportive, but, of course, as usual, I had to leave early because I can only handle so much. But it's worth it. Thing is, I'm moving to San Francisco. Anybody know of any good places to jam for the blues in SF?

'fraid not. We had someone with a harmonica jam with us once, which was fun.
Check the web sites in 'frisco, Craig's list, etc. Might be something there.

Thanks, pakled. Will do.

But maybe you can give me your take on this: There was one aspect to the whole thing I didn't like. This base player (upright base, a woman, unusual) took over leading the band while I was adjusting the height of the mic.

Things got a little fluy from the start because a friend of mine signed me up to jam before I got there. I was only there a few minutes and they called me up. I wanted to use my own mic, a honking! 1952 vintage harp mic. I probably could have plugged it into the guitar players amp, but I had to get my harp out of my harp case, and decided to just use their mic because the base player was so impatient. She said, "You know you're supposed to direct the band." And I was doing that! I was telling the pianist, "Key of E, shuffle, from the I." But as I was adjusting the mic height, SHE! started calling out the count! It really pissed me off. I wanted to call out the count that I was comfortable with, luckily hers was the same I was planning. Also, I was planning to do 4 choruses because it was my jam and then give them each two choruses and then bring it home together. But she decides to tell me to be quiet after two choruses and let the piano take it. Well at least I got to indicate that it was her turn. And then I did my other two choruses. Then SHE! announced to bring it home. I was gracious, but it really pissed me off because I had it all planned out how I was going to lead it and she just reamed into my territory.

Also I'm a blues dancer too, so I was going to dance during their solos--you know, just quiet grooving with my hips on the side, not taking over the show on their solo.....and she says "Just relax." I had it with her and I'm glad I'm moving. --I guess when I don't know the soloists I shouldn't dance while they play. Is that so? I was originally expecting a friend of mine to play the guitar and I know we would have had fun while he played and I danced because I would be responding to his music and it would be a conversation.

The good part was that I was totally on the rhythm. It all happened so fast though, so I wasn't centered and I missed a 5blow on a IV chord once and blew once when I should have drawn, but the mic wasn't so good, so it wasn't real obvious. The best part is that I didn't know exactly what they would play for a shuffle and I worried it would throw me off, but it was real easy to stay with them as far as the rhythm and the chord changes. I felt really in sync that way.

The only hard part was the woman trying to be the alpha. So this was a great learning experience. Any comments about what I can learn from this? How it usually goes down? Did I misunderstand anything?

PS: My harp teacher will know of places to jam too, maybe in San Jose where it is a little lower key for the stage I'm at.

Thanks.