As remarkable and improbable as this event seems to be --Garcia dropping into a bar on Haight Street on New Year's Eve '78-'79, before heading over to close Winterland in a play-'til-dawn extravaganza with the Dead-- it very much seems to have happened. David Kramer-Smyth deserves the finder's fee, posting about this in a comment at Nick's deadthinking blog, based on DKS's conversations with one of the partners in the Shady Grove. Garcia only played the first set of this gig, then made the short jump over to Winterland to join the goings-on there. Merl Saunders, Jr. has subsequently confirmed to IFJGS researchers that this gig took place. Wow.